GHULAM RASUL AND Others vs Hajan BAKHTAWAR AND Another
This petition for special leave to appeal challenged a Lahore High Court order modifying a temporary injunction granted by a trial court in a suit for declaration of ownership regarding urban property. The central legal question was whether the High Court erred in allowing ejectment proceedings before a Rent Controller to continue despite a status quo order granted in favor of the plaintiffs. The Supreme Court held that the High Court's modification was legally sound and did not prejudice the petitioners. The Court reasoned that the High Court's order permitted the continuation of the Rent Controller's proceedings but expressly maintained the status quo regarding the physical ejectment of tenants. Consequently, the petitioners remained protected against actual dispossession during the pendency of the suit, even if the Rent Controller issued an ejectment order. The principle laid down is that while proceedings before a special forum like a Rent Controller may be allowed to proceed, a civil court's injunction maintaining status quo can effectively protect parties from the physical consequences of those proceedings, such as actual eviction, until the final adjudication of the underlying ownership dispute.
- Can a High Court modify a temporary injunction to allow proceedings before a Rent Controller to continue while maintaining status quo on physical possession?
- Does the continuation of ejectment proceedings before a Rent Controller necessarily violate a status quo order regarding the property's physical possession?
- Order XXXIX Rule 1, Code of Civil Procedure 1908
1. MUHAMMAD AFZAL ZULLAH, J.-This petition for special leave to appeal by the plaintiffs in a suit arises out of the modification made by a learned Single Judge of the Lahore High Court in exercise of revisional jurisdiction in an order passed by a learned Civil Judge granting temporary injunction in favour of the petitioners.
2. The petitioners had filed a suit for declaration qua ownership to the extent of 33/80 shares in an urban property. The learned trial Judge on their application under Order XXXIX, rule 1 of the Civil Procedure Code, as mentioned in this petition, (copy of the order not produced), "restrained (the defendants) from changing the status of the property and maintaining the status quo with respect to the whole of the property till the final decision of the suit". The respondents' appeal before the learned District Court having failed, their main plea in the High Court was that the trial Court order was bad at least in so far as the proceedings launched by them before the Rent Controller for the ejectment of the tenants was unassailable. The learned High Court proceeding on the assumption that a joint owner could file an ejectment petition against a tenant held that the question would be splitted into two parts, one dealing with the proceedings of ejectment before the Rent Controller and the other with the general question of maintenance of status quo. With regard to the first question it was further held that there was no justification in staying the proceedings before the Rent Controller.
3. Learned counsel has contended that some of the tenants are paying rent to the petitioners while the others had attorned to the respondents. The respondents intend to eject those tenants who have attorned to the petitioners. This, as argued, would injuriously affect the right of the petitioners.
4. The argument in so far as it goes might have some merit, but the order passed by the learned Judge in the High Court is neither against any, law nor principle. Moreover, it does not injuriously affect the petitioners' interest or the tenants who have attorned to them because the impugned order has permitted the continuance of the proceedings before the Rent controller and has in no way affected the order for maintenance of statue quo in so far as their physical ejectment by the respondents (as a result of an ejectment order it and when passed) is concerned. This supposition is amply clean from the following observations made in para. 7 of the impugned order:- "Modify the order of injunction to the extent that it will not apply to the stay of proceedings before the Rent Controller against the tenants. The other portion of the stay, viz, the maintenance of status quo otherwise shall remain in force."
5. The result is that the order for maintenance of status quo passed in favour of the petitioners, in so far as the physical ejectment of the tenants is concerned, would protect the latter during the pendency of the suit, notwithstanding the continuance of the proceedings before the Rent Controller, even if they end in an order of ejectment. With these observations we find no merit in this petition, and the same is dismissed.
Cited by 5 cases
- ABDUL GHANI vs ABRAR HUSSAIN 1999 SCMR 348
- PAKISTAN BURMAH SHELL vs DISTRICT JUDGE And Other 1996 MLD 391
- PAKISTAN BURMAH SHELL vs DISTRICT JUDGE and others 1996 MLD 391
- MUHAMMAD SHARIF SHADY and others vs Syed ABDUL MAJID and others 1987 MLD 385
- ANWAR KHAN Versus ABDUL MANAF 2004 SCMR 126