Supreme Court Pulls Up Tenant Who Disowned Undertaking To Deposit Rent Arrears; Directs Cost To Be Paid To Punjab Flood Relief Fund

The Supreme Court recently deprecated the conduct of a tenant who tried to disown his undertaking given to the Court to deposit rent arrears by claiming that his advocate had given the statement without his instructions.

The bench comprising Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria imposed a cost of Rs. 10,000 on the tenant. The cost has to be deposited in the Punjab CM's disaster relief fund.

The bench was hearing a petition challenging the High Court's order to strike off the tenant's defence in the eviction suit for not depositing the admitted rent arrears in terms of Order 15 Rule 5 of the Civil Procedure Code.

The case concerned eviction proceedings where the tenant claimed his lawyer exceeded instructions by undertaking to deposit rent arrears without authority. However, the High Court's order recorded that the tenant was personally present and had instructed counsel before submittin the undertaking.

Holding that the court's record is sacrosanct and reflects the true account of events, the Supreme Court didn't appreciate the petitioner's attitude and decided to impose the cost while dismissing the petition.

“we are not impressed by the said argument on account of recalcitrant attitude exhibited by the petitioner before the High Court and having made an attempt to lay the blame at the doors of the learned advocate who appeared on his/her behalf though he had appeared in court and had instructed the advocate to make such statement and had been denied. Such conduct should not only be deprecated but also should be curbed with iron hands as otherwise the stream of justice is likely to be polluted by such stray incidents as has happened in the instant case.”, the court said.

“In that view of the matter we are inclined to dismiss this petition with cost of Rs.10,000/- (Rupees Ten Thousand) payable to the Chief Minister's Flood Relief Fund (Government of Punjab).”, the court ordered.

Cause Title: SANTOSH GOSAIN VERSUS M/S BELI RAM SAREEN & ANR.

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Ms. Bharti Tyagi, AOR Mr. Tarun Bhati, Adv. Mr. D. K. Singh, Adv. Mr. Vikash Kumar, Adv. appeared for Petitioner(s)