Deemed completion under rent law follows first assessment date, not actual occupation, preserving the ten-year exemption period.

Where a building is subject to assessment, Explanation I(a) to section 2(2) deems completion to occur on the date the first assessment comes into effect, and actual first occupation becomes relevant only if there is no report, record or assessment. The provision was treated as plain and unambiguous, so no additional requirement could be read in that the building must have been constructed after the Act commenced. On that basis, the deemed completion date governed the ten-year exemption period, the building had not crossed that period when revision was decided, and section 39 could not be invoked to displace the eviction decree.

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Issues: Whether a building subject to assessment is deemed to have been completed on the date of the first assessment under Explanation I(a) to section 2(2) of the U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction) Act, 1972, and whether the Act or section 39 thereof applies to a building merely because the period of ten years is computed from actual occupation rather than from the first assessment.

Analysis: Section 2(2) creates a ten-year exemption from the Act for a building from the date on which its construction is completed. Explanation I(a) expressly provides that, where a building is subject to assessment, completion is deemed to occur on the date on which the first assessment comes into effect, and only in the absence of report, record or assessment does actual first occupation become relevant. The language was held to be plain and unambiguous, leaving no scope to add a further requirement that the building must have been constructed after the commencement of the Act. Since the building in question was subject to assessment, the first assessment date governed completion. On that basis, the building had not crossed the ten-year period when the revision was decided, and section 39 could not be invoked.

Conclusion: The building was rightly treated as completed on the date of the first assessment, and the Act did not apply so as to defeat the eviction decree.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a statute deems completion of a building on the date of first assessment, that deemed date prevails over actual occupation, and a clear exemption provision must be applied according to its plain language without importing extra words or conditions.

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