M. S. H. QURESHI, J.-This is a tenant's appeal by leave of this Court granted to consider whether he had been served with a notice as required under section 30 of the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act, 1958.
2. The question arose in the following circumstance. Appellant Manzoor Ahmad has been in possession of tenement No. 1/3 on the first floor of building situate on Plot No. $. Survey-sheet IV, Napiers Quarters, Lalmandas Street, Karachi. This tenement, being an evacuee property, had been transferred to one Ferozuddin by the Settlement Department under a P. T. O. Issued in January, 1961 followed by PTD issued in December, 1964. Muhammad Amin, the respondent in this appeal, purchased it from Ferozuddin in April, 1965. He moved a petition for ejectment of the appellant but as according to his own admission, he had not served any notice under section 30 of Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act, nor did he know if such notice had been served by Ferozuddin, the original transferee, the petition was dismissed by the Controller on 20-5-1966.
Muhammad Amin, hereafter, served a notice on 24-5-1966, stating therein that the tenement in question had been finally transferred in favour of Ferozuddin from whom he had purchased it in April, 1965 and that the appellant was to pay rent to him which was due from September, 1965 at the rate of Rs. 4 p. m. The notice also contained a demand for payment of the rent so due. When no rent was received by him, Muhammad Amin brought a fresh petition on 15-10-1966 seeking ejectment of the appellant on the grounds of default and personal use. It appears that the appellant sent rent by money order on 21-10-1966 i, e. Subsequent to the institution of the new petition but the same was refused. The appellant, however, made appearance before the Controller with counsel and took time to file written statement, but neither he nor his counsel appeared thereafter nor was a written statement filed. The Controller, accordingly, proceeded ex parte and recorded the evidence of the landlord. The Controller, however dismissed the petition upon the view that the notice served by him, was not a notice within the meaning of section 30 which' envisaged such notice to be given by the original transferee He also noticed that the landlord had not examined Ferozuddin to establish the factum of the purchase of the property from him. The landlord, however, succeeded on appeal before the Additional District Judge, Karachi who disagreed with the Controller that the notice had to be served by the original transferree himself. He also disagreed that the landlord had failed to prove his ownership of the property observing that "the respondent (tenant) having chosen to remain absent in the lower court, it did not lie in his mouth, to make this contention in appeal now". The view taken by the learned Additional Dis--trict Judge was upheld .By a learned single Judge of the High Court, who by his impugned order dated 20-9-1973 dismissed appellant's second appeal.
3. Section 30, no doubt, does require that the notice shall be given by the "transferee" but there is nothing in that section to suggest that the word "transferee" means none other than the original transferee himself. Therefore, where a transferee without giving such notice dies and thereby the property devolves on his heirs, or he alienates the property and thereby divests himself of all his rights and interests in the property, it is difficult to deny that the legal representatives in the event of the transferee's death or the vendee in the event of sale, would step into the shoes of the transferee, and. Would b vested with all the rights and privileges conferred by the law on the transferee.
Under rule 4 of Permanent Transfer Rules, 1961, a transferee from the Settlement Department becomes entitled to hold and enjoy the property and all the rights, title and interests appurtenant thereto transferred to him, and to transfer or alienate the same in accordance with the normal law.
By virtue of section 8 of Transfer of Property Act, transfer of property passes forthwith to the transferee all the interest which the transferor is then capable of passing in the property and in the legal incidents thereof. Thus there can be no doubt that the respondent did acquire, by the purchase of the property from Ferozuddin, all the rights title and interests in the property which had vested in Ferozuddin. Such rights must ipso facto include the right to seek eviction of the tenant in accordance with section 30 of the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act in the same manner as the original transferee could. In Mst. Saida Naim Hussain v. Abdul Ghani (PLD 1976 Kar. 675); a notice had been served by the heir of the transferee but no objection had been taken on that account. The notice under section 30, therefore, could be given by the heir of the transferee or the vendee from him as the case may be.
Moreover, the fact that the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act, 1958 stood repealed w. e. f. 1-7-1974 by Act XIV of 1975 cannot escape notice of, this Court as a supervening fact. In this regard reference may be made to the following observations made by M. A. Zullah, J. In Muhammad Ramzan v. Ch. Bashir Ahmad (PLD 1981 SC 340): "In fact it has not been found necessary to examine the other question because the controversy involved on the basis of correct understanding of the intention underlying the relevant provision of section 30 itself. With these clarifications and in the light of the foregoing discussion, the argument of the learned counsel with regard to notice under section 30, and the application of section 6 of the General Clauses Act are repelled. The petitioner was not entitled to a notice nor the protection and the respondent, was not under any liability to send such a notice to the petitioner before filing the eviction petition because the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act of 1958 having been repealed, it was not necessary. "The requirement of service of notice has, therefore, since lost its efficacy and can n longer be pressed as a ground for allowing the appeal."
4. Even otherwise, the notice was proper notice within the meaning of section 30. It contained all the ingredients of such notice as required under that section i. e. The factum of transfer in favour of the transferee, of the purchase from the transferee and demand of rent from the date of these purchase. This also takes care of the contention that there was no notice given under section 13-A of the West Pakistan Rent Restriction Ordinance, 1959 or that such notice cannot be combined with the notice under section 3 of the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act. The notices could be combined. The material information required to be conveyed to the tenant under section 13-A was contained in the notice. Moreover, service of a separate notice under section 13-A was not necessary if the factum of purchase was within the knowledge of the tenant. Counsel for the appellant before us conceded that the appellant had received the notice dated 24-5-1966. A separate notice specifically under section 13-A was, therefore, not necessary. In Khuda Bakhsh v.
Muhammad Yaqoob etc. (1981SCMR 179) it was observed : "The reason for a notice under section 13-A is to inform the tenant that the landlord has sold the property to another person so that rent could thereafter be paid by the tenant to the new landlord.
In this case knowledge of transfer admitted by the petitioner, and hence even if a notice had not been served under section 13-A, it would not stand in the way of the Court in granting the relief that it has granted."
We, therefore, find no merit in this appeal and, accordingly, dismiss it though we made no order as to costs.