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Issues: (i) Whether the High Court, in revision, was justified in reappreciating the evidence and setting aside the concurrent finding of exclusive possession and sub-letting; (ii) whether the arrangement with the tailor and the ice-cream seller amounted to sub-letting or only a licence.
Issue (i): Whether the High Court, in revision, was justified in reappreciating the evidence and setting aside the concurrent finding of exclusive possession and sub-letting.
Analysis: Revisional power under the Rent Act was wider than the narrow jurisdiction under section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure, but it did not convert the revisional court into a first or second appellate court. Where the courts below had reached a concurrent finding on evidence that was supportable on the record, the revisional court was not justified in substituting its own view merely on a fresh appraisal of the same material. The finding of exclusive possession in favour of the alleged sub-tenant was based on direct evidence and admissions, and the High Court's reliance on collateral material and on a different assessment of the evidence was held to be unwarranted.
Conclusion: The High Court was not justified in interfering with the concurrent finding in revision.
Issue (ii): Whether the arrangement with the tailor and the ice-cream seller amounted to sub-letting or only a licence.
Analysis: The distinction between a lease and a licence turns on the substance of the transaction, the transfer of a right to enjoy the premises, and the existence of exclusive possession, not merely on the label used by the parties. A document executed between the tenant and the alleged occupier is only one piece of evidence when the landlord is not a party to it, and its form cannot defeat the real nature of the arrangement. On the facts proved, the tailor and the ice-cream seller were found to be in exclusive possession of portions of the premises, the documentary explanations were treated as self-serving, and an inference of sub-letting for consideration was permissible.
Conclusion: The arrangement amounted to sub-letting and not merely a licence.
Final Conclusion: The eviction order was restored because the landlord established unauthorised sub-letting, and the High Court had erred in reversing the concurrent findings of the authorities below.
Ratio Decidendi: In landlord-tenant disputes, a revisional court cannot ordinarily supplant a concurrent finding of fact that is supported by evidence, and where exclusive possession of premises by another is proved, the real substance of the arrangement may show sub-letting notwithstanding a contrary label of licence.
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