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Official Citation: 2026 LHC 4835
Court / Jurisdiction: Lahore High Court
Parties: MUHAMMAD WASEEM TAHIR & 1 OTHERS vs ADJ ETC
Ruling Summary: This decision was rendered by the Lahore High Court, officially reported as 2026 LHC 4835. In this matter between MUHAMMAD WASEEM TAHIR & 1 OTHERS and ADJ ETC, the court adjudicated key questions of statutory construction, procedural regularity, and legal precedent under Pakistani law.
Core Holding: The honorable bench evaluated governing statutory provisions and judicial authorities to establish the rights of the parties, delivering the binding reasoning set out below.
COURT: Lahore High Court (Honorable Mr. Justice Muzamil Akhtar Shabir) DECISION DATE: 24-06-2026 TAGLINE: As the application for setting aside ex-parte proceedings was dismissed by treating the said application as time barred without mentioning that how and under what criteria the said application was time barred and the said order has been held to be not sustainable and of no legal effect, the entire superstructure based on the said order is also not sustainable. CASE DETAILS: Writ Petition-Civil Proceedings-Rent 2765-26 ============================================================ Stereo. H C J D A 38
JUDGMENT SHEET IN THE LAHORE HIGH COURT, MULTAN BENCH, MULTAN. Judicial Department
WP No. 2765 of 2026 Muhammad Waseem Tahir & another Versus ADJ, Sahiwal etc.
JUDGMENT
Date of hearing: 24.06.2026.
Petitioners by: Mr. Mumtaz Hassan Khan, Advocate. Respondent No.3 by: Mahr Imtiaz Younas Tullah, Advocate. In attendance: Rana Ghulam Hussain, Assistant Attorney General for Pakistan. Mr. Musleh-ud-Din Khan and Malik Muhammad Bakhsh Khakhi Assistant Advocate Generals, Punjab.
MUZAMIL AKHTAR SHABIR. J. Through this constitutional petition, Muhammad Waseem Tahir and Muhammad Faisal Tahir, the petitioner s (‘who were respondents before the courts below’) have called in question the legality of orders and judgments dated 06.11.2025 and 10.02.2026 passed by the forums below, whereby ejectment petition fil ed under the Punjab Rented Premises Act, 2009 („ACT‟) by Shakeela Parveen, respondent No. 3 (“respondent”) against the petitioners has been concurrently accepted with the result that the petitioners have been directed to vacate the possession of the premises within thirty days and respondent has been held entitled to recover defaulted monthly rent as prayed for with 10% annual increase till vacation of premises. 2. The learned counsel for the petitione rs states that respondent instituted an ejectment petition in which the learned Rent Tribunal, Sahiwal , vide order dated 29.04.2025 proceeded ex -parte against the petitioners and the application filed by petitioners for setting -aside ex parte proceedings initiated against them has been dismissed on 18.06.2025 and the ejectment petition was W.P.No.2765 of 2026 2 accepted vide impugned order dated 06.11.2025 . The appeal filed by the petitioners against the same has been dismissed by the learned Additional District Judge, Sahiwal vide impugned judgment dated 10.02.2026. It is claimed that the forums below have not pro perly exercised the jurisdiction vested in t hem and have ignored the fact that the applications for setting aside order to proceed ex - parte and leave to contest filed by the petitioners were well within time, therefore, the same could not be rejected on technical grounds and in view thereof, the impugned decisions being result of mis -reading and non -reading of material available on record and the resulting ejectment orders being superstructure of the said void orders are not justified and hence, liable to be set-aside. 3. On the other hand, learned counsel for respondent has defended the said orders/judgments by stating th at the petitioners were served through notices on 21.04.2025 but deliberately chose not to appear in court despite service and they were proceeded against ex-parte on 29.04.2025, whereafter the petitioners on 08.05.2025 filed two applications, first for setting aside the order to proceed ex - parte against them and second for grant of leave to contest , which w ere badly time barred, therefore, the same were rightly dismissed and the impugned decisions including the said orders and subsequent decisions whereby ejectment orders had been concurrently passed were justified being in accordance with law. 4. Perusal of the record shows that on 04.04.2025, ejectment petition for vacation of House No. 198/U Farid Town, Sahiwal („Rented premises‟) was filed by respondent against the petitioners, by claiming herself to be owner/landlord of premises on basis of transfer of title and all rights in the property to her by her father namely Chaudhry Faqir Muhammad , who was the original owner of the property and also the landlord on the basis of an oral tenancy agreement and respondent also claimed that despite service of repeated notices including legal notice s, the petitioners neither paid arrears of rent nor vacated premises and were defaulters in payment of rent since November 2022. W.P.No.2765 of 2026 3 The learned Rent Tribunal vide order dated 08.04.2025 issued notices for the service of the both the petitioners for 29.04.2025. The said notices were served upon petitioner No. 1 on 21.04.2025. On 29.04.2025 due to non-appearance of the petitioners despite aforementioned service upon petitioner No. 1 , which was treated as valid service on both the petitioner as both were brothers and resided at same place, they were proceeded against ex-parte and respondent was directed to produce ex-parte evidence on 12.05.2025. In the meanwhile on 08.05.2025 , the petitioners filed an application for setting-aside ex-parte proceedings initiated vide order dated 29.04.2025 accompanied with an application for grant of leave to contest. The said application s were dismissed by the trial court vide order dated 18.06.2025 by observing that scope of the Act is very limited and it cannot be broadened and extended in a discretionary way to grant relief in favour of any party to avoid technicalities and further held that application is badly time-barred and the same w as accordingly dismissed. While passing the said order, it is not clear that whether the co urt considered contents of both the applications simultaneously and dismissed both the applications on merits or only dismissed the application for setting aside ex -parte proceedings, which consequently would also result in implied dismissal of the applica tion for grant of leave to contest , however whatever mode was adopted, the result was that both the said applications stood dismissed through the impugned order passed by the Rent Tribunal. The operative portion of the order dated 18.06.2025 is reproduced below for clarity and reference: ‘5. Record shows that on the date of service of summons on 21.04.2025, the applicant Muhammad Saleem Tahir was personally served through the notice, who also undertook to receive summons on behalf of his brother Muhammad Faisal Tahir, but neither he himself appeared in the court on upcoming date fixed in the summons as 29.04.2025 when their suit seeking enforcement of agreement to sell was pending nor he produced his real brother respondent No.2 in the court. The contents of application in hand are self -contradictory i.e., applicants admit to be in the knowledge of pendency of ejectment petition as well as order passed against them but they adopted lethargic attitude instead of appearing before court and waited for lapse of s tatutory period for filing of their leave to contest. The W.P.No.2765 of 2026 4 scope of the Act is very limited and it cannot be broadened and extended in a discretionary way to grant relief in favour of any party to avoid technicalities. However, principle of fair trial and e quity are there for consideration, which cannot be ignored while passing any order, such as he who seeks equity must come in court with clean hands and he who seeks equity, must do equity prior to knocking the door of court. Furthermore, law aids the vigil ant and not indolent. Application is badly time barred and accordingly is dismissed. The petitioner shall tender her supporting evidence on next date when the final order shall be passed. Now to come up on 25.06.2025.’
5. Subsequently, on 06.11.20 25 eject ment order was passed against the petitioners by accepting the ejectment petition filed by Respondent . The appeal filed by the petitioners to challenge the said order was dismissed by the learned Additional District Judge, Sahiwal on 10.02.2026 and the ejectment order passed by the Rent Tribunal was maintained by observing that said order was based on proper appreciation of facts available on record and the petitioners had failed to point out any illegality, irregularity or jurisdictional defect in the imp ugned orders. 6. Both the said orders are under challenge before this Court and the claim of petitioners as per their learned counsel is that both the aforesaid applications filed by the petitioners were well within time for the reason that even if it is assumed that the petitioners were served with notices on 21.04.2025, yet the date fixed for appearance of the petitioner s was 29.04.2025 and at the most had they appeared on the said date before the Rent Tribunal in response to the afore-referred notice, from the said date fixed for their appearance , application for leave to contest was within time, which application had been accompanied with the application for setting-aside ex-parte proceedings filed by the petitioners on 08.05.2025, which also had been filed within time. It is claimed that said aspect of the matter has not been addressed by both the courts below hence the impugned order , which has been passed in a hasty manner by declaring the applications as time barred without appreciation of record and being a non-speaking order is not sustainable, whereas the claim of respondent is that as the petitioners did not appear despite W.P.No.2765 of 2026 5 notice, they were rightly proceed ed against ex -parte and order of dismissal of their applications for setting a side ex-parte proceedings and application for leave to contest was rightly passed and ejectment order s concurrently passed by both courts were justified. 7. For decision of the said controversy between the parties the relevant provisions of Rented Premises Act, 2009 may be taken into consideration. An ejectment petition is filed under the provisions of Section 19 of the Act. The procedure for proceeding further with the ejectment petition is provided under Sections 21, 22 and 23 of the Act and for ready reference the same are reproduced below: ‘21. Appearance of parties and consequences of non -appearance.– (1) If an application under this Act other than application for deposit of rent is filed, the Rent Tribunal shall issue notice to the respondent i n the form prescribed in the Schedule, for appearance of the respondent on a date not later than ten days through process server, registered post acknowledgement due and courier service. (2) A notice under sub -section (1) shall be accompanied by copies of the application and the documents annexed with the application. (3) If the respondent fails to appear and the Rent Tribunal is satisfied that– (a) the notice has not been served on the respondent or the respondent is willfully avoiding the service of the notice, the Rent Tribunal may direct service of the notice by: (i) affixing a copy of the notice at some conspicuous part of the rented premises or residence of the respondent; or (ii) publication in the press, electronic media or any other mode; and (b) t he notice has been served, the Rent Tribunal may proceed ex -parte and pass the final order. (4) If an ex -parte order is passed against a respondent, the respondent may, within ten days from the date of knowledge, apply to the Rent Tribunal for setting aside the ex-parte order along with an application for leave to contest. (5) If the respondent shows a sufficient cause for his non appearance, the Rent Tribunal may set aside the ex -parte order on such terms as it may deems fit. (6) The parties may appear in person or through a recognized agent in the Rent Tribunal. (7) If on a date fixed, the applicant fails to appear, the Rent Tribunal may dismiss the application. (8) If an application has been dismissed in default of the appearance of an applicant and an ap plication for restoration of the same is made within thirty days of the dismissal order, the Rent Tribunal may restore the application on such terms as it may deem appropriate. 22. Leave to contest .– (1) A Rent Tribunal shall not allow a respondent to defend the application unless he obtains leave to contest. W.P.No.2765 of 2026 6 (2) Subject to this Act, a respondent shall file an application for leave to contest within ten days of his first appearance in the Rent Tribunal. (3) An application for leave to contest shall be in the form of a written reply, stating grounds on which the leave is sought and shall be accompanied by an affidavit of the respondent, copy of all relevant documents in his possession and, if desired, affidavits of not more than two witnesses. (4) The Rent Tribunal shall not allow leave to contest to a respondent unless the application discloses sufficient grounds for production of oral evidence. (5) The Rent Tribunal shall decide the application for lea ve to contest within a period of fifteen days from the date of its filing. (6) If the leave to contest is refused or the respondent has failed to file application for leave to contest within the stipulated time, the Rent Tribunal shall pass the final order.
23. Written reply. – If the leave to contest is granted, the Rent Tribunal shall treat the application for leave to contest as a written reply.’
8. The perusal of the provisions of sub-section (1) of Section 21 shows that when petition/application for ejectment of tenant is filed the Rent Tribunal is required to issue notice to respondent therein in the form prescribed in the Schedule, for appearance of the respondent on a date not later than ten days through process server, registered post acknowledgement due and courier service and under sub -section (2) of Section 21 the notice under sub -section (1) is required to be accompanied by copies of the application and the documents annexe d with the application. The notice mentioned in the Schedule referred to above is reproduced for perusal: SCHEDULE {See sub-section (1) of section 21} (Name of the Rent Tribunal) (Title of the application) To ___________________(Name, description and plac e of residence). Whereas_______________________ (name of the applicant) has filed application for __________________________ (nature of the application) against you under the Punjab Rented Premises Act, 2009 for ___________ (nature of the prayer), of which a copy is hereto annexed and is fixed for ____________ (date).
You are hereby directed to obtain leave to contest the application from the Rent Tribunal described above within ten days of the date of hearing/appearance mentioned above. In default whereof, W.P.No.2765 of 2026 7 the Rent Tribu nal may pass a final order in favour of the applicant. Leave to contest may be obtained on an application in the form of written reply and specifying a ground(s) on which the leave is sought, accompanied by your affidavit and, copies of all the relevant d ocuments in your possession and, if so desired, affidavits of not more than two witnesses. Given under my hand and the seal of the Rent Tribunal on this _______ day of __________.
Special Judge (Rent)
On issuance of notices in the aforementioned terms different consequences would arise in cases due to service or non -service of notice on respondent, which are provided in sub -sections (3)(a) and (3)(b) of Section 21. In terms of sub-section (3)(a) of Se ction 21, if respondent fails to appear and Rent Tribunal is satisfied that notice was not properly served or respondent is willfully avoiding service of the notice, it could direct service of the notice through alternate mode of service provided by the said section, which is by (i) affixing a copy of th e notice at some conspicuous part of the rented premises or residence of the respondent; or (ii) publication in the press, electronic media or any other mode. 9. On the other hand, where a notice is served and respondent of the ejectment petition fails to appear, the Rent Tribunal in terms of powers vested in it under sub-section (3) (b) of Section 21 of the Act may , if satisfied that notice has been served, proceed ex -parte against the respondent of ejectment petition and pass the final order. The definition of final order is provided under sub -section (b) of section 2 of the Act, which means an order culminating the proceedings of Rent Tribunal, however order passed in execution proceedings are excluded. The said definition is reproduced below: ‘(b) “final order” means a final order passed by a Rent Tribunal culminating the proceedings including an order in respect of adjustment of pagri, advance rent, security, arrears of rent, W.P.No.2765 of 2026 8 compensation or costs but shall not include an order passed in an execution proceedings;’
It is pertinent to mention here that despite what has been mentioned above, where a notice is served upon the respondent in the ejectment petition in terms of sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Act, the said respondent in terms of sub-section (2) of Section 22 of the Act had to file an application for grant of leave to contest within 10 days of his first appearance in the Rent Tribunal . However, it is pertinent to mention here that the wording of the notice provided in the schedule prepared in terms of sub-section (1) of Section 21 issued to the respondent of the ejectment petition directs the respondent of the ejectment petition to obtain leave to contest the application from the R ent Tribunal within ten days of the date of hearing/appearance mentioned in the notice served upon the said respondent, which means that despite slight variance in the wording of the section and the draft of notice provided in the schedule, the application for grant of leave to contest is to be filed within next 10 days from the date fixed in the notice for appearance of the petitioner before the Tribunal and not from the date of service of notice upon the respondent of the ejectment petition i.e. petitione rs herein , which legal position negates the stance taken by the counsel for the respondent i.e. ejectment petitioner in support of his argument to defend the impugned orders whereby he claims that limitation would start to run from the date of service of n otice on the respondent of the ejectment petition. In the present case despite service of notice on 21.04.2025 upon the present petitioners, as the date of appearance in the notice was fixed as 29.04.2025, the petitioners, whether they appeared in the cour t on the said date or not had time of 10 days available with them to file an application for grant of leave to contest which had to expire on 09.05.2025, which aspect of the matter was not W.P.No.2765 of 2026 9 considered by the court while passing the order of proceeding ex -parte against the petitioners. 10. Furthermore, in the instant case although the court initiated ex -parte proceedings against the petitioners on 29.04.2025 , the final order for ejectment was not passed rather the matter was adjourned for respondent to lead e vidence in support of her claim for seeking order of ejectment against the respondents. It appears that by adopting the said procedure, the Rent Tribunal wanted to satisfy itself of the correctness of assertions made in the ejectment petition before passing any further orders in the case. Although such course of action is not specifically mentioned in Section 21 of the Act and in terms of Section 34 of the Act provisions of Qanun -e- Shahadat Order, 1984 and Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 were not applicable to proceedings pending before the Rent Tribunal, yet due to the use of word „may‟ in su bsection (3)(b) of Section 21, the said procedure was not barred and was permissible under the law to be followed by the Rent Tribunal as the Rent Tribunal was not required to pass a final order immediately on p roceeding ex -parte against the petitioners and could adopt any procedure to reach a just conclusion of the matter , subject to the condition that the said procedure was not beyond its jurisdiction or prohibited by law. Reliance in this behalf may be placed on Muhammad Tariq Khan versus Khawaja Muhamma d Jawad Asami and others (2007 SCMR 818), wherein while dealing with a matter relating to the jurisdiction and powers of Rent Controller provided in erstwhile West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance (VI of 1959) , the Supreme Court observed as under:- ‘7. As mentioned above, the Rent Controller is free to evolve his own procedure for disposal of the eviction petition and can follow the enabling provisions of C.P. C. or the principles contained therein. It is also a settled principle of law that Rent Co ntroller being a persona designata governed by a special statute has no W.P.No.2765 of 2026 10 jurisdiction to impose costs while allowing the application for production of additional evidence of the party in the proceedings.’
11. It is a settled principle of law and Administration of justice th at every procedure that promoted the administration of justice was permissible unless it was expressly prohibited. Reliance is placed on Muhammad Ijaz Ahmad Chaudhry versus Mumtaz Ahmad Tarar and others (2016 SCMR 1) and H.M. Saya and Co. versus Wazir Ali Industries Ltd. (PLD 1969 SC 65 ). Furthermore, the Courts are not to act upon the principle that every procedure is to be taken to be prohibited unless it is expressly provided for by the Code of Civil Procedure, but on the conv erse principle that every procedure is to be understood as permissible till it is shown to be prohibited by law and a s a matter of general principle, prohibition cannot be presumed. Reliance is placed on Meera Shafi versus Ali Zafar (PLD 2023 Supreme Court 211). Even otherwise, it is a settled proposition of law that where a court, Tribunal or forum is vested with jurisdiction to pass the final order, unless expressly prohibited by law it is also vested with jurisdiction to pass interlocutory orders to reac h the final conclusion in the matter. Reliance is placed on Sindh Employees’ Social Security Institution and another versus Adamjee Cotton Mills Ltd. (PLD 1975 Supreme Court 32) , Tanveer-ur-Rehman versus Pakistan International Airline Corporation (2009 PLC (C.S.) 28 (Karachi) ), Mian Basharat Ahmed versus Rent Controller/Sub ‑ Judge, Muzaffarabad and 2 others (PLD 1998 Azad J&K 5). 12. However, in the instant case, before the evidence of the respondent was recorded, the petitioners filed the application for setting aside ex -parte proceedings initiated against them accompanied with application for leave to contest. The question that next arises is that whether provisi ons of sub - section (4) & (5) of Section 21 would be applicable to entertain the said W.P.No.2765 of 2026 11 application when the said subsections are mentioned in law after the sub - section (3) of the said section providing for passing of final order. For ready reference the said subsections are reproduced below: ‘(4) If an ex -parte order is passed against a respondent, the respondent may, within ten days from the date of knowledge, apply to the Rent Tribunal for setting aside the ex -parte order along with an application for leave to contest.
(5) If the respondent shows a sufficient cause for his non appearance, the Rent Tribunal may set aside the ex -parte order on such terms as it may deems fit.’
13. The perusal of sub -section (4) reproduced above shows that it mentions ex -parte order and does not mention that term /words „final order” as used in sub-section (3)(b) of Section 21, hence it can be extended to the situation whereby the court instead of passing the final order passes an order to proceed ex-parte against the respondent and fixes the matter for further proceedings before the matter culminates in the final order. 14. Moreover, as already noted above as Section 21 of the Act does bar initiating ex -parte proceedings against the respondents before passing an ex-parte final order, hence where the Rent Tribunal had started ex -parte proceedings against the petitioners, who were respondents in the ejectment petition, then it would also be competent to also adopt same procedure for setting aside ex-parte proceedings initiated against the petitioners. 15. Another aspect of the matter is that the petitioners were required to file application for leave to contest in the eviction petition within 10 days of their appearance in the court in terms of sub -section (2) of Section 22 of the Act and if it is correct that the petitioners were served on 21.04.2025, they could not have been expected to appear in the Rent Tribunal before the…
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