KARAMAT NAZIR BHANDARI, J. - Petitioner faced an eviction application brought by respondent- Masjid on the ground of default etc. The application was contested by the petitioner by denying that the petitioner was the tenant. According to the petitioner he was holding the property in his on rights as transferee from the earlier occupant. The issue was duly tried by the learned Rent Controller, who vide judgment dated 19.6.1991 dismissed the eviction application. The landlord succeeded in appeal and the Appellate Court found that the relationship did exist and that the petitioner having contumaciously denied the relationship, was liable to eviction straightaway. Vide judgment dated 22.1.1992, the petitioner was granted two months' time to vacate the premises.
Through this Constitutional petition, the petitioner has impeached the validity of appellate judgment.
2. Respondent-landlord was issued pre-admission notice and he has duly entered appearance.
Record of the Rent Controller was also summoned by this Court and the same is available.
Although-technically the case is still in motion but since respondent has also been heard, the same is being finally disposed.
3. In support of the petitioner, learned counsel has laid great stress on the documentary evidence showing that the respondent is not the owner of the disputed plot. He wants this Court to hold that the land under-neath belongs to the Central Government and as such the claim of the respondent of being landlord has been wrongly upheld. This very argument has been repulsed by the Appellate Court on the ground that for being landlord it is not necessary that one should be the owner also.
The Appellate Court heavily relied on the rent note Ex.AW-2/1 to conclude that the petitioner cannot deny the relationship and that he should have no concern with the ownership of the property.
4. The reasoning adopted by. The Appellate Court is very sound. The rent note has been duly proved through evidence of scribe and the marginal witnesses. The statement of AW-2 a marginal witness clinches the issue. This witness asserted that he was petitioner's friend since childhood and that in his presence he executed the rent note and that the witness was the signatory of the same.
The claim of this witness was not challenged in the cross-examination. In other words, the petitioner would be deemed to have accepted the assertion made in the examination-in-chief As the conclusion that petitioner executed the rent note is correct and is hereby upheld, the other controversy regarding ownership has become irrelevant. . The petitioner having taken the property under the rent note will be deemed to be the tenant. The finding and the judgment of the Appellate Court is, therefore, sound and calls for no interference on this score. .The denial of relationship being contumacious, no further proceedings were called for to eject the petitioner.
5. For what has been stated above, this petition is without merits and is hereby dismissed, with no order as to costs.