Local fund cess in rent may be recoverable where it forms part of contractual consideration, subject to statutory notice.

A Government-imposed local fund cess forming part of the contractual consideration for use and occupation of land is not barred by a tenancy provision prohibiting a landlord from levying cesses, rates, taxes or services on a tenant. The text distinguishes landlord-imposed exactions from a cess the landlord is himself liable to pay and notes that recovery machinery under the land revenue law may apply to such cess. It also states that rent can include a separately described cess if it is part of the agreed consideration. Recovery assistance, however, must be considered under the statutory scheme after notice to the tenants before coercive steps are taken.

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Issues: Whether local fund cess payable by a landlord could be recovered from tenants as part of the rent or consideration for use and occupation, and whether the Collector was bound to grant assistance under the revenue law for such recovery.

Analysis: The relevant local law made the cesses recoverable in the same manner as land revenue and extended the recovery machinery of the land revenue law to the recovery of such cesses from tenants. Section 11 of the Tenancy Act prohibited a landlord from levying cesses, rates, taxes or services from a tenant, but the prohibition was construed as aimed at cesses imposed by the landlord and not at a Government-imposed cess which the landlord was liable to pay. The Court further held that, on the proper meaning of rent under the Act, a payment which formed part of the contractual consideration for the use and occupation of the land could amount to rent, even if described separately as local fund cess. On that basis, the landlord's claim was not barred by Section 11, and the Collector's refusal could not rest on a correct construction of the statute. However, because the tenants had not been heard, the Court directed that the matter should be determined after notice to them before coercive recovery machinery was applied.

Conclusion: Local fund cess could not be treated as prohibited merely because it was separately described in the lease, and the Collector was required to deal with the application according to law after hearing the tenants.

Final Conclusion: The petitioner obtained a direction for reconsideration of the recovery application in accordance with the statutory scheme, but the Court did not itself finally adjudicate the tenants' liability in their absence.

Ratio Decidendi: A Government-imposed cess forming part of the contractual consideration for the use and occupation of land is not barred by a provision prohibiting a landlord from levying cesses on tenants, and recovery assistance must be considered under the statutory machinery accordingly.

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