Tenancy inheritance is law-bound

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: We are a Hindu undivided family comprising my aging uncle, who is the karta of the HUF, my aunt and five brothers of us. The HUF owns a three storeyed residential building at Dadar in Mumbai. The second and the third floor premises are occupied by the family. The ground floor premises are let from inception. The tenant passed away in 1991. His son has been living separately in Bandra for the last 20 years.

But after his mother’s death in 1999, he wrote to my uncle transfer the tenancy of ground floor to him. Can we evict the tenant on grounds of personal need? Since he has been living separately for the past 20-odd years, has he not lost the right to inherit his parents’ tenancy?
— Kasturbhai Lal Bhai, MUMBAI

Even though your HUF has issued rent receipts in your deceased tenant’s name for all these years, it does not alter the fact that the premises have continued to be tenanted. The Maharashtra Rent Control Act, 1999, makes tenancy inheritable. The tenants’ heir do indeed have a right to seek transfer of the tenancy in his name.

The earlier stipulation that if the tenant acquired a property of his own in the intervening period then he was liable to eviction has been omitted from the 1999 Act and thus this is no longer available either as a ground for eviction or a ground for denial of tenancy rights under the MRC ACT, 1999.

It is also no longer necessary for the inheritor tenant to have been living with the old tenant continuously for a period of six months prior to his death to claim tenancy inheritance rights.

In the event no body was living with the deceased tenant at the time of his death then the right to inheritance of tenancy would have automatically passed on to the tenant’s heirs and it is for the courts of law to decide as to which of his/her heirs would be entitled to secure tenancy rights.