Article 227 powers can be exercised to interfere with perverse, unreasonable orders of trial court: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday held that even though Article 227 does not provide it with powers to sit as an appellate court but when the trial court orders are perverse, unreasonable and passed by overlooking the relevant facts, the High Court can exercise its supervisory jurisdiction under Article 227 to interfere (Sneha Ahuja v Satish Chader Ahuja)..The stern remarks came from single judge Justice Asha Menon as she set aside an order of trial court which had evicted a woman from her matrimonial home as her husband had filed for a divorce. The High Court said that in the present case, the trial court seemed keen on passing the eviction order without "proper application of mind" to all the circumstances. "No doubt the powers under Article 227 of the Constitution of India cannot be exercised as if the court is an Appellate Court. However, when the learned Trial Court overlooks significant facts and considers irrelevant facts, this Court in its supervisory jurisdiction would interfere with a decision of a Trial Court, especially in the event the orders appear to be perverse and unreasonable," the judgment said.Justice Menon also pulled up the trial court for its 'total insensitivity' for issuing the direction for eviction at the peak of the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. “The hospitals were overflowing with patients and no family had remained untouched by the mayhem caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet, it left the petitioner to search for herself and take some premises on rent,” the Court said..The petitioner woman had been married to the respondent in 1995 and lived together till 2014 on the first floor of the house. The ground floor was occupied by the woman's in-laws. In 2014, the husband filed for divorce, post which the in-laws sought eviction of the petitioner through the trial court, which was granted .The trial court directed the husband and her in-laws to pay the petitioner two months' advance rental amount in order to enable her to rent a place for herself, while she was directed to vacate the suit property within 40 days from the date of the first payment.This compelled her to file the petition before the High Court.The Court noted that petitioner had to actually file an application in October, 2020 seeking payment of electricity charges as her husband had refused to pay the same. "In this factual background, without ensuring that the directions issued for payment of future rent would be complied with without fail, the learned Trial Court asked the petitioner to vacate the premises by 15th June, 2021," it said.The Court added that in light of these special circumstances, the trial court's direction to the woman to shift out into a rented accommodation were 'most unwarranted'. .The counsel appearing for the husband and her in-laws had argued that the presence of the petitioner on the first floor of the suit premises caused great distress to them as they were being threatened and abused by the petitioner.The Court, however, said that Section 3 of the Senior Citizens Act, 2007 cannot be deployed to override and nullify other protections in law particularly that of a women’s “right to a shared household” under Section 17 of the Domestic Violence Act."The fact situation had to be assessed at least on a prima facie evaluation before directing the eviction of the daughter-in-law from what she describes is her ‘shared household’. It bears repetition that the Supreme Court has held that what constitutes a shared household is a matter of evidence."The court also rejected the argument that since the situation in Delhi were getting in terms of the pandemic and therefore the petitioner could shift to some other premises. "Though it was argued before this Court by the learned counsel for the respondents that now that there was no pandemic like situation in Delhi and therefore the petitioner could shift to some other premises, in view of the other circumstances as enumerated above, this Court does not find any force in this submission," it said. .While the petitioner woman was represented by Senior Advocate JP Singh along with Prashant Mehta, Himanshu Kapoor, Manisha Mehta and RL Sinha, advocate Prabhjit Jauhar appeared for the respondents..[Read Judgment]