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Seventh Day Adventist Senior Secondary School v. Ismat Ahmed and Others

Civil Appeal · 2025 INSC 984Decided 13 Aug 2025
C.A. No.-010649-010649 - 2025 (arising out of SLP(C) No. 10900 of 2024)
Justice J.K. Maheshwari · Justice Aravind Kumar

Background

A school that was a tenant in a flat in Kolkata was sued for eviction by its landlord on grounds including arrears of rent. After being served with summons, the tenant-school filed applications seeking protection under Section 7 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act, but did so 17 days late (partly because courts were closed for Durga Puja), and separately asked the court to excuse this delay under the Limitation Act. Both the trial court (Small Causes Court) and the Calcutta High Court refused to excuse the delay, so the tenant appealed to the Supreme Court.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that the 30-day deadline in Section 7 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act for a tenant to deposit admitted rent and file an application is mandatory, not merely directory, and cannot be extended using Section 5 of the Limitation Act. The Court examined the specific wording of the statute (the use of "shall" versus "may") and concluded that only the later stage, payment after the court determines the exact rent due, carries a discretionary two-month extension proviso; the initial 30-day deposit-and-filing requirement has no such flexibility. Since the tenant here neither deposited the admitted rent nor filed its application within 30 days of being served, it lost the statutory protection against eviction, and the appeal was dismissed.

Lesson Learnt

Tenants facing an eviction suit for non-payment of rent must deposit the admitted rent and file any dispute application within the strict statutory deadline (here, 30 days of receiving summons). Courts will not extend this deadline using general limitation-law excuses like "the delay was only a couple of weeks" or "courts were on holiday," so acting immediately upon receiving legal papers is essential.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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