Shaikh MUHAMMAD KHALIL vs Haji CHAND MUHAMMAD
This petition for leave to appeal before the Supreme Court of Pakistan challenged the concurrent findings of the Rent Controller and the High Court ordering the petitioner's eviction on the ground of default. The respondent, father-in-law of the petitioner, was the admitted titleholder of the property and sought eviction, alleging a tenancy at Rs. 1,500 per month. The petitioner denied the landlord-tenant relationship, claiming he facilitated the property's transfer to the respondent, occupied it, and funded construction. The core legal questions pertained to the determination of the landlord-tenant relationship in the absence of written tenancy documentation between close relatives, and the applicability of estoppel against questioning the owner's title. The Supreme Court upheld the concurrent findings, ruling that the lack of written documentation was understandable given the familial relationship and that the petitioner entered possession prior to the Sindh Rented Premises Ordinance. The Court held that under Article 115 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat, 1984, a person inducted into possession is estopped from denying the landlord's title. Consequently, the petition was dismissed, granting the petitioner three months to vacate.
- Whether the absence of a written tenancy agreement under Section 5(1) of the Sindh Rented Premises Ordinance invalidates an eviction proceeding when possession was inducted prior to the Ordinance's promulgation?
- Whether an occupant inducted into possession by an admitted property owner is estopped under Article 115 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat, 1984 from challenging the owner's title or entitlement to repossess?
- Can a landlord-tenant relationship be established on a preponderance of evidence without rent receipts or a written agreement where the parties share a close familial relationship?
- Section 5(1), Sindh Rented Premises Ordinance
- Article 115, Qanun-e-Shahadat 1984
ORDER
1. ' WAJIHUDDIN AHMED, J.---The concurrent findings of the learned Controller and the High Court are questioned through this petition for leave to appeal.
2. ' The parties are inter-related inasmuch as the petitioner is a son-in-law of the respondent.
3. Admittedly, the property in dispute stands in the name of the respondent. The respondent instituted Rent Case No,698 of 1995 wherein he claimed that the petitioner was his tenant at the rate of Rs,1,500 per month but having defaulted since January 1995 was liable to be evicted. The petitioner denied the relationship of landlord and tenant, said that it was he who got the property transferred in the. Name of the respondent, was allowed to occupy the same and had spent a sum of Rs,300,000 towards its construction. According to him there was also a mediation through the gentlemen of the locality but the respondent did not abide by it. Apparently, there was some inconsistency in the pleas and the evidence raised and led by the petitioner. The Controller as well as the High Court found the relationship to exist and passed the order of eviction on the ground of default.
4. We have been taken through the evidence in the case. There is no written agreement of tenancy and admittedly the respondent did not pass on any rent receipts to the petitioner. The fact, however, remains that the respondent is admitted to be the owner of the property and it was for the petitioner, who concedes being inducted by the respondent, to establish the nature of his possession. In the circumstances, where the parties are as closely related, as above, it is not inconceivable that rents were being paid without proper documentation. There is evidence to such effect. As to the absence of a written agreement of tenancy, in the contemplation of section 5(1) of the Sindh Rented Premises Ordinance, suffice it to say that it is the petitioner's own case that he came into possession prior to the promulgation of the Ordinance. It has also been urged that there was an effort on the part of third parties to reconcile the contestants but nothing in writing emerged. What is more, even the amount claimed by the petitioner to have been spent by way of constructing the property is not vouched for by any material. This is a classic case where in terms of Article 115 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat, 1984, a person, put into possession, as tenant or as licensee, by another, is estopped from questioning the title at the inception of the one who inducted him or, except in clearly categorised cases, the entitlement of such a one to repossess.
5. ' In these circumstances where the respondent has obvious title to the property and where he has led evidence to show that the petitioner was his tenant, the case seems to have been correctly decided on preponderance of evidence. There has been no misreading of evidence, nor are the findings perverse or otherwise beyond the record. The petition, accordingly, is dismissed but the petitioner, subject to payment of rents as hitherto before, is allowed three months' time to vacate, whereafter, unless the property is voluntarily handed over, the respondent would be free to apply for execution which would be enforced, without notice to the petitioner, with necessary police aid and breaking open of the lock, if need be. .