Response

The rent receipt on your name will be valid document for your occupation in the pagdi system house as a tenant unless, the owner if intends to evict you from the property/premise you cannot have any defence. You may have to go by the court order because there is no protection in law for purchasing the pagdi system house, the purchaser will still be treated as a tenant only, and in the absence of any valid rental agreement or rental receipt he may be treated as an illegal occupant and likely to be evicted by due process of law. Generally, upon the death of a pagdi tenant, the tenancy rights are transferred to the legal heir/s who were living in the flat when the tenant died, by asking the landlord to issue the new rent receipts in the heir/s name/s. Section 56 of this Act deemed it legal as it reads as follows:

1. The tenant or any person acting or purporting to act on behalf of the tenant to claim or receive any sum or any consideration, as a condition of the relinquishment, transfer or assignment of his tenancy of any premises;
2. The landlord or any person acting or purporting to act on behalf of the landlord to receive any fine, premium or other like sum or deposit or any consideration in respect of the grant, or renewal of a lease of any premises, or for giving his consent to the transfer of a lease to any other person.

Therefore, a land owner could confer a kind of ownership to the tenant for a deposit of money. This partial ownership means that the tenant has a certain right over the property but not the land. In this case, the part-owner can even sublet the premises but the rent that he gets must be divided between the actual owner of the property and the part-owner that is the first tenant. The original owner gets to earn a little extra, because of such a provision.

Reference: Section 56 of of Rent Control Act, 1999

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LAWAYZ-2023-816