Isri Chowdhury And ANR v. Ranger Realty Private Limited

04.02.2026 Court No. 06 Item No. 23 Sandip

IN THE HIGH COURT AT CALCUTTA

CIVIL REVISIONAL JURISDICTION APPELLATE SIDE C.O. 4113 of 2025 Smt. Isri Chowdhury & Anr.

-Versus- Ranger Realty Private Limited Mr. Pranit Bag, Mr. Aniruddha Saha Ray, Ms. Anjali Singh .....for the petitioner 1) The petitioners are the tenants in a suit for eviction under Section 6 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act, 1997 (hereinafter referred to as the said Act). The petitioners are aggrieved by an order dated September 18, 2025, passed by the learned Judge, 5th Bench, Presidency Small Causes Court at Calcutta in Ejectment Suit No. 148 of 2024.

2) By the order impugned, the learned Court rejected an application under Section 7 (2) of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act on the ground that the said application was misconceived. The same was filed without compliance of the provisions of Section 7(1) of the said Act. The Court relied on the decision of the Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of Seventh Day Adventist Senior Secondary School v.

Ismat Ahmed and Others., reported in 2025 SCC Online SC 1696, in support of its decision. The Court held that it was the mandate of law that when an application under Section 7(1) was filed before the Court, the

admitted arrear rent along with 10% thereof should be deposited.

3) Section 7(1) provides as follows :

7 When a tenant can get the benefit of protection against eviction.- (1)(a) On a [suit] being instituted by the landlord for eviction on any of the grounds referred to in section 6, the tenant shall, subject to the provisions of sub-section (2) of this section, pay to the landlord or deposit with [the Civil Judge] all arrears of rent, calculated at the rate at which it was last paid and upto the end of the month previous to that in which the payment is made together with interest at the rate of ten per cent per annum.

(b)Such payment or deposit shall be made within one month of the service of summons on the tenant or, where he appears in the [suit] without the summons being served upon him, within one month of his appearance.

(c)The tenant shall thereafter continue to pay to the landlord or deposit with [the Civil Judge] month by month by the 15th of each succeeding month, a sum equivalent to the rent at that rate."

4) In this case, the petitioners filed an application under Section 7(1), inter alia, contending that there were no dues and the petitioners were only required to comply with Section 7(1)(c) of the said Act. The petitioners filed an application under Section 7(2) and admitted the arrears, thereby asking the Court to determine the rent/arrears and to allow delayed deposit of the arrears. It was admitted in paragraph 9 of the application that the tenant was in default from November 2020 till February 2021.

5) The proper course of action of the petitioners would be to deposit the said admitted arrears with interest at the rate of

10% per annum along with the application under Section 7(1). The petitioners approached the Court by filing a misconceived application. Instead of admitting the arrears in the application under Section 7(1), the petitioners admitted the same under Section 7(2). The application under Section 7(2) could only be filed simultaneously along with the application under Section 7(1) and with the deposit of the admitted arrears. Under such circumstances, without depositing the admitted arrears, the application under Section 7(2) did not have any legal existence.

Even if the Court posted the application for hearing at a belated date, it was the duty of the tenant to save himself from a decree of delivery of possession for nonpayment of rent by availing of the opportunity under Section 7(1) of the said Act and by depositing the arrears in Court with the filing of the application under Section 7(1) of the said Act. In the decision of Seventh Day Adventist (supra), the Hon'ble Apex Court held as follows:- "12.

Bare reading of the aforesaid provisions makes it clear that as per sub section (1) of Section 7, in a suit for eviction filed by the landlord on any grounds as specified in Section 6 of the WBPT Act, the tenant shall, subject to provisions of subsection (2), pay to the landlord or deposit in the Court, all arrears of rent calculated at the rate at which it was last paid together with interest at the rate of ten per cent per annum. As mandated by Section 7(1)(b), the said payment or deposit shall be made within one month from the date of service of the summons on tenant or from the date of appearance in case the tenant appears without service of summons. The said two provisions apply in a case where arrears of rent are admitted.

continue to pay or deposit with the landlord or Civil Judge, as the case may be, a monthly sum of rent at that rate on or before fifteenth day of consecutive month.

13. As per sub-section (2), if there is a dispute as to the amount of rent payable by the tenant, he is required to deposit the admitted amount due from him in the Court within the time as specified [one month as per Section 7(1)(b)] 'together' with an application for determination of the rent payable. It is emphasised that deposit of rent shall not be accepted unless the said prayer is accompanied with an application for determination of the rent. Meaning thereby, to seek protection against eviction, the tenant is required to deposit the admitted amount of rent within the time as specified, i.e., within one month from the date of summons served or where tenant appears in the suit without the summons being served upon him, along with an application for determination of the rent so payable. As such, in case where there is no dispute as to arrears of rent, it ought to be paid within a month and, in case it is in dispute, even then, tenant would be required to deposit within the same time coupled with an application as discussed above.

14. To supplement the aforesaid, word 'together' used in Section 7(2) preceding 'with an application for determination of the rent payable' emphasises that the deposit of admitted amount of rent within a period of thirty days as specified must accompany the application for determination of rent payable. At this stage, we can profitably refer to 'P.

Ramanatha Aiyar's Advanced Law Lexicon'5 to understand the meaning of 'together'. According to the same, 'together' means "in company" or "conjointly" or "simultaneously".

Accordingly, on contextual application of the word 'together', it is clear that the application for determination of rent must be filed within the same period which is provided for 'deposit' or 'pay', i.e., thirty days.

15. On receiving such application, the Court having regard to the rate of rent last paid and period of which default has been made by the tenant shall make an order on

such application not later than one year and thereupon the tenant shall within the period of one month of the date of such order, pay to the landlord the amount so specified in the order. That is to say, the determination of the rent on the parameters as specified in the latter part of sub-section

(2) and on such determination within one month of the date of the order, the amount as specified in the order is to be paid. The proviso thereto deals with the extension of time, which can only be once and not beyond period of two months.

16. Having perused Section 7 of WBPT Act, it is apparent that sub-section (1) is subject to sub-section (2). Further, sub-section (3) specifies consequences of non-compliance of sub-sections (1) and (2) by the tenant, leading to striking out of defence against delivery of possession and the Court shall proceed with the hearing of the suit. Subsection (4) of Section 7 of WBPT Act makes it clear that in a proceeding of eviction, no order for delivery of possession of the premises to the landlord shall be passed by the Court on the ground of default of payment if the tenant deposits the rent under sub-sections (1) or (2), but the Court may allow such cost to the landlord as deemed fit. As per proviso, it is clear that if tenant was allowed the relief as indicated hereinabove, but later he makes default in payment of rent for four months within one year or in case three successive rental periods, where the rent is not payable monthly, the relief of protection against eviction available under sub-section (4) cannot be allowed granting benefit of protection against eviction to the tenant.

17. In view of the foregoing, while bringing the said Section, the legislative intent was to provide protection to the tenant against eviction, subject to compliance of deposit of arrears of rent if there is no dispute as to amount of rent, within one month from the date of service of summons, along with interest at the rate of ten per cent per annum. The tenant is further required to deposit the regular rent as prescribed in Section 7(1)(c). In case, there is a dispute of the amount of rent payable, the tenant is required to deposit the amount due as admitted by him within thirty days and file

an application conjointly for determination of rent within the same period. The said application may possibly be entertained and decided by the Court thereafter only.

This Court in the case of Bijay Kumar (supra) had an occasion to consider the scope of Section 7(2) of the WBPT Act wherein the tenant had not deposited or paid the admitted rent while moving an application seeking determination of rent. Trial Court while allowing such application granted time to pay the admitted rent, but High Court set-aside the order of the Trial Court. While confirming the order of the High Court on the issue of deposit of rent admitted by tenant under Section 7(2) on the application for determination of rent, this Court observed as under - "21. ...the deposit of rent along with an application for determination of dispute is a precondition to avoid eviction on the ground of nonpayment of arrears of rent. In view thereof, tenant will not be able to take recourse to Section 5 of the Limitation Act as it is not an application alone which is required to be filed by the tenant but the tenant has to deposit admitted arrears of rent as well."

18. Thus, in case of disputed rent, this Court was of the view that to avail the benefit of protection against eviction under the WBPT Act, the tenant has to do the following to avoid eviction, first, to deposit rent admitted by him to be due; second, an application for determination of rent payable be filed along with. The tenant had neither deposited, nor paid the admitted rent and had only filed the application for determination of rent belatedly along with an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act, 1963.

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29. In addition, Section 7(1) and first part of sub-section (2) of Section 7 are comparable, both requiring deposit/pay admitted/undisputed amount of rent.

However, Section 7(2) casts an additional obligation on the tenant to file an application for determination for rent along with such deposit within the specified time frame. The Legislature in its wisdom did not provide for any extension of time for payment or deposit under Section 7(1),

making it clear that no such extension was intended in the corresponding part in Section 7(2). Since the deposit and application are to be made together by the tenant mandatorily within a specific time, in our considered view, extension of time as given in proviso to Section 7(2) is not applicable to either. Therefore, the proviso can only be construed to permit extension in payment of amount so specified in order of determination passed by the Civil Judge as envisaged in the latter part of subsection (2) of Section 7. Stated differently, the word 'may' used in the proviso of Section 7(2) would only relate to extension of time, which is a discretion vested with the Civil Judge and it would not construe any other meaning. Moreover, it can be said that since in subsection (3) of Section 7, the consequence of non-compliance has been specified, therefore, use of the word 'shall' in Sections 7(1)(a), 7(1)(b) and 7(2) is a mandatory compliance for the tenant, failing which, his defence against eviction shall be struck off.

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32. In the said context, if we see the intent of legislature as discussed and relying upon two cases of three-Judge Bench of this Court, we intend to explain that Section 7 of the WBPT Act prescribes when a tenant can get the benefit of protection against eviction. The opening word of subsection (1) i.e., 'on a suit being instituted by the landlord for eviction' makes it clear that in case the tenant defaults in payment of rent and the suit is brought as specified in the WBPT Act, then on deposit/payment of admitted rent, an opportunity ought to be provided to get the benefit of protection against eviction. Therefore, for availing such benefit, some pre-requisites are there, which is of deposit of the rent, either disputed or undisputed as admitted, within the specified time.

In case, the rent is disputed, the tenant has to mandatorily file an application, by virtue of word 'shall' used to such extent either in Section 7(1)(a) (b)(c) or first part of Section 7(2).

after compliance of the pre-deposit and on filing an application for determination within the specified time, such payment has to be made by the tenant within one month of date of order passed by Civil Judge. The proviso refers to extension of time with an intent to grant one more opportunity to the tenant after determination of rent for deposit.

33. At this juncture, we also deem it relevant to refer sub-section (3) of Section 7, wherein it is specified that if tenant fails to deposit or pay any amount referred in subsection (1) or sub-section (2) within the time specified therein or within such extended time as may be granted by the Court, his defence against delivery of possession shall be struck out. So it deals with the following contingencies; first is of Section 7(1)(a)(b)(c), second is of former part of Section 7(2) and third is of latter part of Section 7(2) and in default of either of the situations, the Judge shall order the defence against delivery of possession to be struck out and shall proceed with the hearing of the suit specifying the consequences of failure to do any of the three situations.

While using the word extended time in sub-section (3), the word shall has been used, therefore, this would also be referable to the provision which leads to the conclusion that in case the tenant fails to deposit the determined amount within the time specified or within the extended time. In that contingency the order of striking out of defence be passed and suit be proceeded for hearing. As explained from above discussion, we are constrained to say that the arguments as advanced by the learned counsel for the appellant relying upon the paragraphs 17, 18 and 19 of the judgment in Debasish Paul (supra) are not germane, hence repelled."

Under such circumstances, this Court does not interfere with the order impugned. The revisional application is dismissed without any order as to costs.

With the dismissal of Section 7(2), the consequences provided under Section 7(3) followed and the Court has rightly recorded thus.

Urgent photostat certified copy of the order, if applied for, be given to the parties, upon usual undertakings.

(Shampa Sarkar, J.)