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Judgment
The petitioner, defendant no.3, is aggrieved of order dated 05.07.2010 by which his application for taking the written statement on record has been
declined.
The petitioner is defendant no.3 in Title Suit No.29 of 2009.
The plaintiff has pleaded that he joined the service under the defendant-M/S CCL on 10.08.1990 and an official accommodation was allotted to
him vide order dated 18.05.2004. The said quarter was under occupation of defendant no.3 who by that time had superannuated from service. The
plaintiff has pleaded that when defendant no.3 refused to vacate the quarter he was constrained to institute the suit for his ejection. The petitioner was
served summons in the suit on 16.07.2009 and he appeared in the suit on 14.09.2009. On the next two dates of hearing in the suit, that is, on
09.10.2009 and 23.11.2009 defendant no.3 was granted time for filing written statement, however, when he did not file the written statement by an
order dated 18.12.2009 he was debarred from filing written statement.
Admittedly, the petitioner filed application dated 23.06.2010 when the plaintiff had already started examining his witnesses. From the impugned
order dated 05.07.2010 it appears that defendant no.3 has cross-examined the plaintiff's witness. Normally parties shall be granted opportunity to
contest the suit on merits and what the Supreme Court has observed “a technical knockout should be avoidedâ€, but the period provided under
order VIII Rule 1 CPC should not be extended to such extents that it would render the statutory provision nugatory [refer “Kailash Vs.
Nanhku†reported in (2005) 4 SCC 480]. Another aspect of the matter is that the defendant no.3 is an ex-employee of M/s CCL-defendant no.1 and
he is occupying the quarter allotted to the plaintiff. It is stated that due to pendency of this eviction suit the defendant no.3 is still occupying the said
quarter.
In the above facts, I am not inclined to interfere in the matter and accordingly this writ petition is dismissed.
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