New Act Will Not Take Away Rights Accrued Under Repealed Law Unless Such Intention Is Expressed In New Statute: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that the rights accrued under an old Act cannot extinguished with the enforcement of the new Act unless a retrospective effect was given to the New Act.

The bench comprising Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and Prasanna B. Varale said so while deciding a tenancy dispute where the rights inherited by the Appellants/tenants under the Old Tenancy Act after the death of the main tenant were extinguished by way of the New Tenancy Act i.e., the provision of the New Tenancy Act was given a retrospective effect without making a provision in the New Tenancy Act regarding its retrospective application.

To clarify, the Old Tenancy Act i.e., the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act, 1956 stated that in the event of the tenant's death, the tenancy devolved on the legal heirs of the tenant who ordinarily resided with him. Whereas, under the New Tenancy Act i.e., the West Bengal Tenancy Premises Act, 1997 the tenancy would devolve to the legal heirs of the tenant, but for a limited period of five years.

The entire issue revolves around interpreting the phrase “for a period not exceeding five years from the date of death of such tenant or from the date of coming into force of this Act, whichever is later” used in section 2(g) of the 1997 Act.

The New Tenancy Act restricted the enjoyment of the tenancy rights inherited by the subsequent tenant upon the death of the main tenant only to a period of five years from the date of enforcement of the New Tenancy Act i.e., from 2001 to 2006. The New Tenancy Act gave a retrospective application to Section 2(g) of the Act to even limit the enjoyment of the tenancy rights to five years inherited by the tenant from its predecessors whose death occurred during the operation of the Old Tenancy Act.

Thus, the appellants/tenant contended that since their father died in 1970 during the operation of the Old Tenancy Act therefore the tenancy rights would be governed by the Old Tenancy Act and not by a subsequent legislation i.e., the New Tenancy Act.

However, the respondent/landlord contended that the appellants could only claim tenancy rights up to five years from the date of enforcement of the New Tenancy Act i.e., from 2001 to 2006 because of its retrospective application. Therefore, the landlord pleaded that since the tenancy rights expired in 2006, therefore, the tenant has no right to remain in possession of the suit premise and prayed for the eviction of the tenant.

Accepting the Appellant's contentions, the judgment authored by Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia observed that “the enforcement of a new statute ipso facto will not take away the rights already accrued under a repealed statute unless this intention is reflected in the new statute.”

The court objected to the literal interpretation of the phrase “for a period not exceeding five years from the date of death of such tenant or from the date of coming into force of this Act, whichever is later” used in section 2(g) of the 1997 Act. According to the court, the literal interpretation of the statute must be avoided if it leads to an absurd result.

On the facts of the case, the court observed that the tenancy rights inherited under the Old Tenancy Act would become redundant if the New Tenancy Act was given a retrospective effect.

“The Single Judge in Goutam Dey v. Jyotsna Chatterjee (2012) observed that a literal reading of 'or from the date of coming into force of this Act, whichever is later' would lead to absurd results as all tenancies devolved under the 1956 Act, would end together on the same day (July 9, 2006), i.e., five years after the enforcement of the 1997 Act! Thus, the Single Judge held the aforesaid phrase to be redundant and a piece of loose drafting by the State Legislature.”, the court said approving the Calcutta High Court's decision of Goutam Dey.

Disapproving the High Court's decision to give a retrospective application to the New Tenancy Act, the court noted as follows:

“the 1997 Act changes “heritable rights” retrospectively according to the Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court. Although, the actual date when eviction would happen is post the new Act but it does have a retrospective application as well in as much as it is applicable retrospectively to an earlier date (1970 in the present case) and had taken away a right of the appellants, given to them under the old statute.”

“Statutory laws operate from the date of their enforcement i.e., prospectively. In case the legislature intends to make a law retrospective then such an intention of the legislature must be shown clearly and unambiguously in the statute itself. The Division Bench's mere interpretation of a statutory provision will not make the law retrospective and take away the heritable rights of a tenant.”, the court added.

Conclusion

“In view of the above, we hold that Smt. Usha Mitra and the appellants jointly inherited the tenancy from Sh. S.K. Mitra, in the year 1970. Thus, the impugned judgment is liable to be set aside as appellants' tenancy did not expire in the year 2006, by the introduction of 1997 Act, in the absence of a clear and unequivocal intention in the 1997 Act to have a retrospective operation.”, the court held

Accordingly, the appeal was allowed.

Appearance

Ms. Rashi Bansal argued for the appellants-tenant

Mr. Sabyasachi Chowdhary argued for the respondent-landlord

Case Title: RAJESH MITRA @RAJESH KUMAR MITRA & ANR. VERSUS KARNANI PROPERTIES LTD., CIVIL APPEAL NOS. 3593-3594 OF 2024

Citation : 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 790

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