K. E. CHAUHAN, J.-Muhammad Afzal (respondent No. 1) (landlord) filed an application under section 13 of the West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance, VI of 1959 for eviction of the present petitioner from House No. 60 situate in Block No. 14, Dera Ghazi Khan City. The case of the landlord was that he was transferee of the aforesaid house from the Settlement Department under a Permanent Transfer Deed (P. T. D.) dated 20-1-1966; that the house was in possession of the present petitioner who became a statutory tenant under him under the Displaced Persons (Compensation and Rehabilitation) Act XXVIII of 1958 (hereinafter called the Act); that the landlord had issued a registered notice on 12-3-66 intimating him of his being the owner of the house and also calling on him to pay the rent; that despite that notice the tenant failed to pay any rent therefore he was liable to eviction. In the written statement filed by the tenant he admitted the factum of transfer of house to the landlord and also receipt of notice. He also conceded that he had not paid any rent to-the landlord pleading that he had challenged the transfer of the house in favour of the landlord and denied the relationship of landlord and tenant. The Rent Controller by means of his judgment and order dated 2-6-75 held that the landlord was a transferee of the house in dispute and that Ghulam Hussain alias Zair (present petitioner) was a tenant under him; that the tenant had admittedly not paid the rent despite service of the requisite notice and he was liable to eviction. He was accordingly directed to vacate the house forthwith.
2. The petitioner filed an appeal which was accepted by the District Judge, Dera Ghazi Khan on 18- 6-76 who held that as the notice issued to the tenant did not make mention of the precise rate of rent claimed therefore the same was defective with the result that there was in the circumstances no valid demand of rent and as such the tenant was not liable to eviction. It appears that the finding on the point of relationship of landlord and tenant was not disputed in arguments before the District Judge.
3. The landlord filed a second appeal which was accepted by a learned Single Judge of the Lahore High Court on 12-3-1978 who upset the judgment and order of the District Judge and restored that of the Rent Controller. The learned Single Judge was of the view that as under the law relevant as contained in section 30 of the Displaced Persons (Com--pensation and Rehabilitation) Act of 1958 a statutory tenant was bound to pay the same rent on which he was holding the property therefore when no particular rate of rent was claimed by a landlord in his notice for demand it implied that the demand .Was for the same rate of rent at which the tenant already occupied the property. In this way he held that there was no defect in the notice of demand of rent and as the tenant had admittedly not paid any rent therefore he was liable to eviction. The petitioner has come up id a petition for Special Leave to Appeal against the aforesaid order to this Court.
4. Learned counsel for the petitioner has raised the same point which he had raised before the High Court and has submitted that failure to specify the rate of rent in a demand notice under section 30 of the Act is fatal and constitutes no demand in the eye of law and as such without a proper demand specifying the precise rate of rent a tenant cannot be subjected to eviction inasmuch as in the circumstances aforesaid it cannot be said that he has failed to pay rent and the real legal position rather is that it is the landlord who has failed to put in a proper demand. We have considered this plea and we find that it has no force in view of the peculiar facts and circumstances of the present case and the law as contained in section 30 of the Act which so far as relevant is reproduced below: "30.-(l) Where any person is in possession of any evacuee house, or shop, or has been declared, on or before the twentieth day of December, 1958, by a Custodian to have tenancy rights from a date prior to the fourteenth day of August, 1947, in any industrial concern, cinema house or printing press which is transferred to any other person under the provisions of this Act then notwith--standing anything contained in any other law, such person shall, without prejudice to any other right which he may have in that house, shop, industrial concern--- cinema house or printing press, be deemed to be a tenant of the transferee on the same terms and conditions as to payment of rent or otherwise on which he held it immediately before transfer Provided that-
(a) it shall be lawful for the transferee to charge a rent on the basis of the latest assessment (carried out by the municipality or local authority, as the case may be, for other properties in the locality generally); and
(b) ----------------------------
(2) ----------------------------
(3) ----------------------------
(4) ---------------------------- A perusal of the above provision of law will show that a person who was in possession of an evacuee house on or before the twentieth day of December, 1958 was by the statute to "be deemed to be a tenant of the transferee on the same terms and conditions as to payment of rent or otherwise on which he held it immediately before transfer". If therefore a notice indicating factum of transfer and making demand of rent was issued without specifying any particular rate of rent it is implied that the rent is being demanded on the same terms and conditions on which the tenant was occupying the house before the transfer. If a tenant therefore fails to pay rent despite such a notice he cannot escape liability merely on the ground that the rate of rent was not specified in the notice. In the instant case when the tenant appeared in the witness-box as P. W.4, according to the finding of the Rent Controller "he persisted that be was not even now prepared to pay him the monthly rent". In this state of affairs it is a contumacious disregard of the statutory liability to pay rent as fixed by section 30 of the Act and consequently his eviction from the house in dispute was perfectly justified. It is not the case of the petitioner that the previous rent was not known to him and from that point of view also the plea raised by him is of no substance. Before parting with this case we may observe that in the present case we are not concerned with the proviso (a) contained in subsection (1) of section 30 and therefore nothing written herein should be considered as an expression of opinion regarding the said proviso.
7. The result is that this petition has no merit and is dismissed. The petitioner is given a period of three months to vacate the house in dispute and hand over its possession to the landlord.