Termination of Tenancy — Grounds (Sections 17–22)

The phrase "grounds for termination, Sections 17-22" is a trap for the unwary. In the Goa, Daman and Diu Agricultural Tenancy Act, 1964 as it stands today, the operative grounds for ending a tenancy live in Sections 9 to 12; Section 17 stands repealed; and Chapter III (Sections 19-22), "Resumption by Landlord", was omitted en bloc by the Fifth Amendment of 1976 and survives only "for information". An exam answer that recites a live resumption code under Sections 17-22 is simply wrong. This note states what each provision actually does, what was repealed and by which amendment, and how the courts read the surviving machinery.

The Section-numbering trap: what 17-22 really contains

Termination is governed by Chapter II of the Act. The genuine "grounds" sit in Sections 9-12: Section 9 lists the modes of termination, Section 10 governs surrender by the tenant, Section 11 sets out the grounds on which a landlord may terminate, and Section 12 makes special provision for non-payment of rent. By the time one reaches the 17-22 band, the picture is dominated by repeal and omission. Section 17 ("Dwelling house of tenant in landlord's site") was repealed by the Goa, Daman and Diu Mundkars (Protection from Eviction) Act, 1975 (Act 10 of 1976), that subject matter being shifted to dedicated mundkar legislation. Section 18 survives and prescribes the procedure for taking possession. Sections 19 to 22 formed the whole of Chapter III, "Resumption by Landlord", which the Fifth Amendment (G.D.D. 17 of 1976) omitted with effect from 8 October 1976; the bare Act today reproduces that chapter only "for information". The correct framing, therefore, is that the live termination grounds are Sections 9-12 and 18, while Sections 17 and 19-22 are studied as repealed/omitted history. For the wider scheme see the introduction and agrarian-reform background.

Modes of termination — Section 9

Section 9 is the gateway provision. A tenancy of any land may be terminated only in three ways: (a) by the tenant, by surrender of his right to the landlord in the manner provided in Section 10; (b) by the landlord, on the grounds specified in Section 11; or (c) under any other specific provision of the Act. The drafting is exhaustive — termination outside these channels is no termination at all. This matters because the whole Act is built on security of tenure: a tenant cannot be evicted save by an order of the Mamlatdar under Section 18(2), and a purported termination that does not fit Section 9 leaves the tenancy intact. Clause (c) is the bridge through which provisions such as Section 18A (deemed purchase on tillers' day) operate to extinguish the landlord-tenant relationship by converting the tenant into an owner.

Surrender by the tenant — Section 10

Section 10 lets a tenant voluntarily surrender his tenancy, but hedges it heavily to prevent landlords from extracting coerced surrenders — the historical loophole that defeated agrarian reform elsewhere. Five conditions must be satisfied for a surrender to terminate the tenancy: the surrender is made at least one month before the commencement of the year; it is in writing and admitted by the tenant before the Mamlatdar; it is made voluntarily and in good faith to the Mamlatdar's satisfaction; it is approved by the Mamlatdar; and the conditions in clauses (a) to (d) of Section 20(4) are met. Where land is cultivated jointly, a surrender not joined in by all joint tenants is ineffective as to those who did not join (Section 10(2)). If the Mamlatdar is not satisfied that the conditions are met, he may refuse approval or submit the case to Government, which may transfer the tenancy right to a fit person, including a Comunidade, co-operative society or panchayat (Sections 10(3)-(4)). The requirement of personal admission before, and approval by, the Mamlatdar is the anti-fraud spine of the section.

Grounds for termination by the landlord — Section 11

Section 11(1) is the heart of "grounds". A landlord may terminate a tenancy only on the ground that the tenant: (a) has failed to pay rent within the time fixed by or under the Act; (b) has done any act destructive of or permanently injurious to the land; (c) has sub-divided, sub-let or assigned any interest otherwise than as permitted under Sections 14 and 15; (d) has failed to cultivate the land personally; or (e) has used the land for a purpose other than agriculture. The list is closed — no "any other reasonable ground" residue exists. Even a proven ground does not automatically end the tenancy. Section 11(2) requires the landlord to give at least ninety days' notice in writing specifying the ground, and the tenancy survives if, within that period, the tenant remedies the breach. A second breach of the same kind attracts a penalty of 50 per cent of that season's rent; but where a breach of the same kind recurs on more than two consecutive occasions, no notice is needed and the landlord may apply straight to the Mamlatdar. Section 11(3) protects vulnerable tenants — a minor, a person under physical or mental disability, or a serving member of the Defence Forces cannot have his tenancy terminated on the sole ground of sub-letting. Crucially, Section 11(4) bars self-help: after the notice period the landlord must apply to the Mamlatdar for permission, who may grant it or refer the matter to Government. The prohibitions in clauses (c) and (d) dovetail with the statutory definitions of tenant, landlord and personal cultivation.

Non-payment of rent — the relief against forfeiture in Section 12

Section 12 softens the harshest of the Section 11 grounds. Where a tenancy is terminated for non-payment and the landlord sues to eject, the Mamlatdar must call on the tenant to tender the arrears together with the costs of the proceeding within thirty days; if the tenant complies, the Mamlatdar passes an order that the tenancy has not been terminated, and the tenant holds as if it never was. This is a statutory relief-against-forfeiture, mirroring equity's traditional indulgence to defaulting tenants. The relief is forfeited, however, where the tenant has failed for any three years to pay rent within the prescribed period and the landlord has complied with any notice requirements (the proviso to Section 12(1)). Section 12(2) caps recovery of arrears at three years, allows set-off of excess payments, and empowers the Mamlatdar, on total or partial crop failure or similar calamity, to remit rent or reschedule arrears over one year. Section 12(3) lets a tenant deposit rent with the Mamlatdar where the landlord refuses to receive it, discharging the tenant's liability — a shield against manufactured default. Rent ceilings that fix what is payable are dealt with under maximum permissible rent.

No self-help: procedure for possession — Section 18

Section 18 is the procedural lock that makes the substantive grounds workable. Sub-section (1) lets a tenant entitled to possession apply in writing to the Mamlatdar. Sub-section (2) is categorical: no landlord shall obtain possession of any land held by a tenant except under an order of the Mamlatdar, on an application in the prescribed form and within the prescribed period. The Mamlatdar, after enquiry, passes such order as he deems fit with due regard to the Act and Rules (sub-section 3). A landlord — or tenant — taking possession otherwise than under sub-sections (1) or (2) forfeits any crops grown, in addition to costs and any prescribed penalty (sub-section 4). The combined effect of Sections 11(4) and 18(2) is that termination and recovery of possession are throughout a matter for the revenue authority, never for unilateral landlord action — the institutional guarantee behind the tenant's security of tenure.

Section 17 repealed: the tenant's dwelling house

The original Section 17, "Dwelling house of tenant in landlord's site", protected a tenant occupying a dwelling house on a site belonging to his landlord from eviction "from such dwelling house (with the materials and the site thereof and the land immediately appurtenant thereto and necessary for its enjoyment as a dwelling house)". That protection did not extend to a dwelling on land whose agricultural tenancy had been terminated for the landlord's personal cultivation. Section 17 was repealed by Section 41(b) of the Goa, Daman and Diu Mundkars (Protection from Eviction) Act, 1975 (Act 10 of 1976), gazetted on 18 February 1976. The repeal was not a withdrawal of protection but a transfer of subject matter: the dwelling-house tenant became the "mundkar", protected under a dedicated statute. For exam purposes the safe statement is that Section 17 is no longer part of the live Tenancy Act, and any dwelling-house protection must be sourced from the Mundkars Act, not from Section 17.

Chapter III omitted: resumption by landlord — Sections 19 to 22

Sections 19-22 once constituted Chapter III, "Resumption by Landlord", the classic agrarian-reform compromise letting a genuine owner-cultivator take back land while protecting the tenant's floor. Section 19 deferred the chapter's commencement until a notified date, not earlier than completion of survey and settlement. Section 20 permitted a landlord who "genuinely requires the land for cultivating it personally" to terminate the tenancy by written notice to the tenant followed by an application to the Mamlatdar, who could authorise termination only after satisfying himself of genuineness. The conditions in Section 20(4) were stringent: the landlord or a family member had to reside in or within seven kilometres of the village; resumption was capped at two hectares of Khajan/Kher paddy land or four hectares of other land; the landlord could not be cultivating other land; the income had to be his main source of maintenance; and among multiple tenancies he could resume only the shortest in duration. Section 20(6) forbade resumption that would leave the tenant with less than half the leased area, or that targeted a member of a co-operative farming society. Sections 20(7)-(8) restored possession to the tenant if the landlord failed to cultivate within a year. Section 21 allowed termination and reservation for non-agricultural purposes with Government permission, applying the resumption machinery mutatis mutandis. Section 22 empowered Government to make special rules for enquiries, selection of land, consolidation of fragments and the timing of termination. The entire chapter was omitted by the Fifth Amendment (G.D.D. 17 of 1976) with effect from 8 October 1976. Because the same amendment introduced deemed purchase, the resumption route was deliberately shut as the policy pivoted from "resume-and-evict" to "tiller-becomes-owner". The omitted resumption scheme is now best contrasted with the live, restored position under resumption of land by the landlord.

Why resumption died: tillers' day and deemed purchase (Sections 18A-18B)

The omission of Chapter III is unintelligible without Chapter IIA, inserted by the same Fifth Amendment. Section 18A provides that on the tillers' day — 8 October 1976, the date the Fifth Amendment Bill was introduced — every tenant is deemed to have purchased from his landlord the land held by him, which vests in him free from encumbrances. A tenant dispossessed before that day who applies under Section 18 is deemed to purchase on the date his possession application is finally allowed; and Section 18A(4) lets the Mamlatdar restore and vest land in a tenant dispossessed otherwise than under Section 11, provided he undertakes personal cultivation. Section 18B defers the right to purchase for minors, widows, the disabled and serving Defence personnel. Once ownership vests in the tiller, there is no longer any tenancy for a landlord to "resume" — hence the deliberate omission of Sections 19-22. The deemed-purchase scheme converts the right of security into a right of ownership; the mechanics of price and certificate are explored under the tenant's right to purchase land.

Who decides? Mamlatdar's jurisdiction and the negative declaration

Because every termination and recovery turns on the Mamlatdar, the scope of his jurisdiction is litigated repeatedly. In Dattaram A. Arolkar v. Mamlatdar of Mormugao, AIR 2001 Bom 74, the Bombay High Court (Goa Bench) held that a Mamlatdar acting under the Act had no jurisdiction to grant a negative declaration that the opponent is not a tenant, relegating such purchasers to the civil court. That reading was decisively corrected by the Supreme Court in Madhumati Atchut Parab v. Rajaram V. Parab, (2009) 4 SCC 183. Construing Section 7 — which empowers the Mamlatdar to decide whether a person "is or was a tenant" and which the Court held to be pari materia with Section 70 of the Bombay Tenancy Act — the Court held that the power to decide whether a person is a tenant necessarily includes the power to declare that he is not. After enquiry the Mamlatdar is bound to record a negative finding where warranted. The practical importance for termination is direct: questions of whether a tenancy exists, whether a ground under Section 11 is made out, and whether possession should pass under Section 18 all fall to the Mamlatdar's exclusive, specialised jurisdiction, with the civil court ousted. Madhumati Parab thus widens the very forum through which the Sections 9-12 grounds are enforced.

Exam takeaways and common errors

First, get the architecture right: live grounds are Sections 9 (modes), 10 (surrender), 11 (landlord's grounds), 12 (non-payment relief), with Section 18 supplying the no-self-help procedure. Second, remember the two repeals/omissions: Section 17 repealed by the Mundkars (Protection from Eviction) Act, 1975, and Chapter III (Sections 19-22) omitted by the Fifth Amendment of 1976. Third, the omission is purposive — deemed purchase under Section 18A (tillers' day, 8 October 1976) replaced resumption with conferment of ownership. Fourth, the landlord can never evict by self-help: Sections 11(4) and 18(2) route everything through the Mamlatdar, whose jurisdiction to decide tenancy questions — including negative declarations — is confirmed by Madhumati Atchut Parab v. Rajaram V. Parab. The classic mistake is to present Sections 17-22 as a working resumption code; the higher-scoring answer flags the repeals and pivots to Sections 9-12 and the deemed-purchase scheme. For orientation across the Act, return to the Goa Agricultural Tenancy Act notes hub.