Appealability depends on final adjudication or punishment order; unresolved rent negotiation and non-punitive contempt are not appealable.

An order that merely leaves rent or use-and-occupation charges to be settled by negotiation, with a liquidator acting as umpire, does not finally determine entitlement or quantify liability; on that basis, an appeal on the rent issue is not maintainable because no substantive adjudication of rights has been made. In contempt matters, appellate scrutiny is not available unless a punishment order has been passed; where no penal consequence has been imposed, the connected contempt appeal is also not maintainable. The document therefore emphasises that appealability depends on a final determination of rights or an actual punishment order, neither of which was present on the stated facts.

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Issues: Whether the appeal against the order rejecting the application for payment of rent and the connected contempt appeal were maintainable when the order only left the rent to be worked out by negotiation and no punishment order had been passed in contempt.

Analysis: The impugned order did not finally determine the appellant's entitlement to rent or use and occupation charges. It merely continued the earlier direction that the rent was to be settled by negotiation, with the liquidator assisting as an umpire. Since the controversy regarding fixation of rent remained open and no concrete adjudication of rights had been made, the order did not furnish a substantive basis for an appeal on merits. On the contempt side, the relevant directions had not been violated in a manner attracting penal consequences, and contempt jurisdiction under the statutory framework becomes appealable only when punishment is imposed.

Conclusion: The appeal against the rent-related order was not maintainable on the facts presented, and the connected contempt appeal was also not maintainable in the absence of any punishment order.

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