JUDGMENT
S.S. Sodhi, J.
1. An apparent design to cause harassment and inconvenience to the landlady stands writ large by the tenant withholding delivery of possession to her of the demised premises which he no longer occupies and are now lying vacant and locked.
2. The demised premises consist of three rooms and a kitchen in a house in Jalandhar, the remaining part of which, having similar accommodation, is in the occupation of the landlady.
3. It was as far back as in 1983 that the landlady filed an application for ejectment against the tenant. Included amongst the grounds for seeking such ejectment being that of personal necessity. The plea put forth, in this behalf, being that she needed the demised premises for use of her grand-son Navin and grand-daughter Rajni, the children of her son Krishan Gopal, who was employed as a teacher in a village in Himachal Pradesh which lacked proper facilities for higher education of the children. During the pendency of these proceedings, the landlady’s grand-son Navin, however, died.
4. Both the Rent Controller as also the Appellate Authority held against the landlady on the issue of personal necessity and on the other grounds for ejectment.
5. When the matter came up in Revision here, the landlady filed an application seeking to have this Court take note of subsequent events that had occurred during the pendency of the proceedings, namely, that her grand-children were now residing with her, while studying in educational institutions at Jalandhar. The matter was, by the order of this Court of November 6, 1990, remitted to the Appellate Authority to submit his report with regard to the plea of the landlady that the premises were required for her personal use and occupation, in the light of the subsequent events as pleaded by her.
6. The Appellate Authority after affording due opportunity to the parties to adduce evidence and taking into account the material on record, recorded the finding “the children for whose necessity the ejectment is being sought are living with Smt. Janki Devi and Janki Devi requires the premises for their use.” It may be mentioned here that the evidence led shows that besides her grand children Lav Kumar and Rajni Joshi. the landlady also had another grand daughter Anupma Joshi staying with her. She too was studying in a college in Jalandhar. Besides this, the daughter-in-law Asha Rani, wife of the landlady’s eleder son Krishan Gopal was also living with her.
7. No infirmity in the report, of the Appellate Authority could be pointed out by the counsel for the respondent-tenant nor could he suggest any reasons to take any different view, in the context of the material as had come on record.
8. On the conclusion of arguments, when it was announced that the revision petition was to be allowed, counsel for the respondent-tenant sought an adjournment to enable him to seek instructions from the tenant regarding, an undertaking to be given for vacating the demised premises. This was on July 14, 1993. No such instructions were, however, forthcoming.
9. When the matter was next taken up for hearing on July 30, 1993, counsel for the respondent stated that he had no instructions regarding any undertaking being given by the tenant for vacating the demised premises. Counsel for the landlady, on his part, informed that the demised premises had, in fact, been vacated by the tenant over an year ago and had been lying locked ever since. This was disputed by the counsel for the respondent and consequently to verify the factual position, Mr. Anand Chhibbar, Advocate, was appointed Local Commissioner to go and see the demised premises and submit his report regarding the correctness or otherwise of what has been stated by the counsel for the petitioner.
10. Now from the report of the Local Commissioner, it stands established that the demised premises are, indeed, lying vacant and locked. According to this report, the three rooms with the tenant were locked from outside and on peeping in he found them to be vacant. Confronted with this report, counsel for the respondent had no explanation to offer.
11. The conduct of the tenant, cannot, in the circumstances, but he branded as malicious and mala fide and, thus, deserves strong condemnation. As will be seen, despite the demised premises lying vacant and an adjournment having been sought on behalf of the tenant, to seek his instructions for vacating them, the tenant neither vacated the premises nor gave any Such instructions to his counsel. This conduct of his, has, of course, to be considered in the context of the fact that the landlady has undergone long litigation in her effort to get back these premises. Obviously, the intention of the tenant has, undoubtedly been to torment and cause discomfort to the landlady. Such being the situation, a direction is hereby issued to the tenant to handback possession of the demised premised to the landlady immediately.
12. This Revision Petition is consequently hereby accepted with costs which shall include not only the costs of the proceedings of the Rent Controller and the Appellate Authority but also those of the Local Commissioner and Rs. 10,000/- are also imposed upon the tenant as punitive costs.