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Civil Petition for Leave to Appeal No. 941 of 1984, decided on 24th October, 1984.

(On appeal from the judgment and order of the Lahore High Court dated 23‑8‑1984 in Writ Petition No. 3739 of 1984).

-‑‑Art. 185(3)‑‑West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance (VI of 1959), S. 15‑‑Ejectment application‑‑Ground of personal need rejected by Rent Controller‑‑Order reversed by appellate Court‑‑High Court, though exercising Constitutional jurisdiction by way of judicial review, re‑examined evidence on record and upheld order of ejectment Supreme Court declined to re‑examine questions of fact conclusively determined by appellate Court as a Special Forum under Ordinance (VI of 1959)‑ Petition being devoid of merits, dismissed.

Muhammad Sharif and another v. Muhammad Afzal Suhail P L D 1981 S C 246 ref.

Sh. Naveed Shehryar, Advocate with S. Abid Nawaz, Advocate- on‑Record for Petitioner.

Ch. Mushtaq Ahmed, Advocate instructed by S. Wajid Hussain, Advocate‑on‑Record for Respondents.

Date of hearing: 24th October, 1984.

The petitioner, who is in occupation of a shop premises as a tenant, is aggrieved by the order of his eviction passed in appeal by the Additional District Judge, Sialkot, and seeks leave to appeal from judgment dated 23‑8‑1984 passed by a learned Judge of the Lahore High Court Lahore, whereby a writ petition filed by the petitioner challenging the order of eviction was dismissed in limine.

The case of .the landlord in the ejectment application was that he required the premises in good faith for establishing a business for his son. The landlord produced before the learned Rent Controller several witnesses in support of his case including himself and his son Ijaz Ahmed. On the other hand, the petitioner also produced two witnesses and appeared himself to rebut the evidence produced by the landlord. The learned Rent Controller, on assessing the respective evidence produced by the parties, came to the conclusion that the landlord had failed to establish that he required the premises for his son in good faith, primarily on the ground that the witnesses produced by him were interested and partial as well as that the conduct on his part reflected upon his bona fides. The learned appellate Court reversed this finding and came to the contrary conclusion for reasons summarized in the following passage of its judgment:‑

"The petitioner Sh. Gulzar Ahmed (landlord) produced two witnesses in support of his claim. He also produced his son Ijaz Ahmed who appeared as A.W. 3 in order to prove that the shop in question is required for his son Ijaz Ahmed. He appeared in his own evidence as A.W. 4. The landlord (A.W. 4) reiterated what he had disclosed in his petition. His version stands fully corroborated by his son Ijaz Ahmed which stands further fortified by the evidence of Sh. Muhammad Salim, A.W. 1, and Muhammad Arif, A.W. 2. These witnesses were subjected to a searching cross‑examination but there is nothing on the file which may tend to discredit their testimony. I am not prepared to discard their evidence simply because on two previous occasions the landlord conceded to the request of the tenant and did not avail his legal remedy and compromised with the tenant on the enhancement of rent. If this plea is accepted then it would lead us to anomalous results because in that case the landlord /appellant would tantamount to a clog in the way of ejectment."

The learned Judge in the High Court, even though he was exercising constitutional jurisdiction by way of judicial review, re‑examined the evidence on record and found that the plea of the landlord was supported by the evidence on record. In his view the finding of the learned Rent Controller was properly upset by the appellate Court and he found no jurisdictional error in the order of eviction passed by that Court. In this regard the learned Judge placed reliance on a case of this Court Muhammad Sharif and another v. Muhammad Afzal Suhail P L D 1981 S C 246, in which this Court had deprecated the excessive invocation of the constitutional jurisdiction of the High Court as though as a substitute for a Regular Second Appeal, although Second Appeals in cases under the West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance, 1959 have been abolished in the province of Punjab.

4. After hearing the learned counsel at length, we are unable to undertake, nor is there any valid ground for doing so, a re‑examination of questions of fact conclusively determined by the learned appellate Court as a special forum under the West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance, 1959. We, therefore, find no merit in this petition which is accordingly dismissed.

M. I. Petition dismissed.

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