The single most litigated question under any rent-control statute is also the simplest to state: when, and on what grounds, may a landlord lawfully recover possession? The UP Regulation of Urban Premises Tenancy Act, 2021 answers this in Section 21, which begins from a protective premise - a tenant cannot be evicted during the continuance of the tenancy agreement except on the enumerated grounds - and then sets out an exhaustive, closed list of those grounds. Unlike the 1972 Act it replaces, the 2021 statute channels every eviction through the Rent Authority and ties each ground to its own procedural conditions. This note examines each ground in Section 21(2), the notice machinery that attaches to some but not all of them, the relief-against-forfeiture provisions in Section 21(3) to (5), and the leading Allahabad High Court rulings interpreting them.
The protective rule: Section 21(1)
Section 21(1) lays down the foundational protection: a tenant shall not be evicted during the continuance of the tenancy agreement, unless otherwise agreed to in writing by the landlord and tenant, except in accordance with the grounds in sub-section (2) or the recovery provisions of Section 22. The grounds in sub-section (2) are exhaustive - a landlord cannot invent a ground outside the list, and a Rent Authority cannot order eviction on a ground not pleaded and proved. Two provisos qualify the protection: where a landlord acquires the premises by transfer, the tenant generally enjoys a one-year shield before eviction proceedings, and the protective scheme operates only in areas notified for application of the Act. The structure mirrors the Model Tenancy Act, 2021: a written, time-bound tenancy under a mandatory tenancy agreement is the norm, and eviction is the regulated exception.
Non-payment of rent: grounds (a) and (b)
The two most common grounds concern money. Ground (a) arises where the tenant does not agree to pay the rent payable under Section 8 - the rent fixed by the agreement or, on revision, as determined under Sections 9 and 10. Ground (b) is the classic arrears ground: where the tenant has not paid the arrears of rent and other charges in full for two consecutive months, including interest for delayed payment, within one month from the date of service of a notice of demand. The statute carves out a humane exception for members of the armed forces, for whom the qualifying default period is extended to one year rather than two months. The defining feature of ground (b) is that it is notice-dependent: the cause of action crystallises only when the tenant fails to clear the demanded arrears within the one-month window after service of the notice of demand. A landlord who skips the notice cannot maintain an arrears eviction.
Sub-letting and parting with possession: grounds (c) and (i)
Two grounds police unauthorised transfers of occupation. Ground (c) applies where the tenant has parted with possession of the whole or any part of the premises without the written consent of the landlord; in the case of a firm or company tenant, an unendorsed change in the constitution of the partnership or control is treated as parting with possession. Ground (i) targets sub-letting proper - where the tenant has sub-let the whole or part of the premises, or transferred or assigned the tenancy rights, in violation of Section 7. Section 7 permits sub-letting only through a supplementary agreement to the existing tenancy, with the landlord and tenant jointly informing the Rent Authority within two months. The distinction matters in pleading: ground (c) captures factual surrender of possession, while ground (i) captures the legal creation of a sub-tenancy or assignment. Either, if unauthorised, exposes the tenant to eviction.
Misuse, illegal use and nuisance: ground (d)
Ground (d) consolidates several behavioural defaults. It permits eviction where the tenant has, after receipt of a notice from the landlord to stop, continued to misuse the premises - including encroachment, unauthorised use inconsistent with the purpose let, the creation of nuisance or annoyance to occupiers of neighbouring premises, causing damage to the premises, or using them for an illegal or immoral purpose. The critical condition built into ground (d) is the notice to desist: a single act of misuse is not enough. The landlord must first serve notice calling on the tenant to stop, and only continued misuse after that notice founds the eviction. This converts ground (d) into a notice-dependent ground alongside ground (b), a point the Allahabad High Court has expressly relied upon when contrasting it with the personal-need ground discussed below.
Structural alterations and substantial removal: grounds (h) and (l)
Ground (h) addresses physical interference with the building: it allows eviction where the tenant has, without the written consent of the landlord, made structural changes or erected a permanent structure on the premises. The protection of the building's fabric reflects the tenant's complementary statutory duty to look after the premises and not cause material damage. Ground (l) is narrower and evidentiary in flavour: it applies where the tenant has substantially removed his goods or effects from the premises, indicating an intention to abandon, which entitles the landlord to recover possession. Both grounds are unconditional in the sense that they do not carry an express prior-notice requirement in the text, distinguishing them from grounds (b) and (d). The rationale is sound: an unauthorised permanent structure or a deliberate stripping of the premises is a completed wrong against which no further opportunity to cure is contemplated, whereas arrears and ongoing misuse are continuing defaults that a desist-and-pay notice may yet remedy. In practice ground (h) frequently overlaps with ground (d), since unauthorised construction is often also a misuse; a careful landlord will plead both, but only ground (d) carries the prior-notice precondition, so the choice of ground affects the procedural burden.
Repair, re-erection and change of land use: grounds (e), (f) and (m)
Three grounds turn on the landlord's need to deal with the building itself. Ground (e) allows recovery where the landlord bona fide requires the premises for carrying out repairs, reconstruction or re-erection that cannot be done without the premises being vacated; the section's provisos protect the tenant's reoccupation rights, permitting reoccupation only under a fresh mutually agreed tenancy and barring reoccupation where the tenant was previously evicted on this ground. Ground (f) operates where the premises are required because a competent authority has ordered a change in the permitted land use. Ground (m) - the most significant in practice - allows eviction where the landlord requires the premises for his own occupation or for demolition and reconstruction. Under the 2021 Act the landlord need only demonstrate that the premises are required by him; the older 1972-era burden of proving strict bona fide necessity has been diluted, as the High Court has confirmed.
Personal need and the notice question
The leading authority on the notice machinery is Mahesh Chandra Agarwal v. Rent Tribunal, Additional District & Sessions Judge, Lucknow, decided by the Allahabad High Court (Lucknow Bench) on 8 January 2024 (Neutral Citation 2024:AHC-LKO:2011, Alok Mathur J.). The tenant argued that no eviction application under Section 21(2) could be filed without prior notice. The Court rejected this, holding that it is not necessary to give a prior notice for vacation in all the contingencies in Section 21(2); wherever notice has to precede the application, the legislature has expressly said so within the relevant clause. Accordingly, the prior-notice requirement attaches only to the grounds where the statute spells it out - notably the arrears ground (b), the misuse ground (d) and the tenant-initiated ground (g) - and not to ground (m), where the landlord requires the premises for personal use. The ruling is a structural one: the presence or absence of a notice condition is determined clause by clause, not by a blanket rule across the whole sub-section.
The landlord's beneficial enjoyment of his property
The substantive content of the personal-need ground was illuminated in Vijay Kumar Banswar v. Awadesh Kumar Jaiswal, decided by the Allahabad High Court on 23 November 2023 (Alok Mathur J.). Upholding an eviction directing a tenant of more than three decades to vacate a shop required for the landlord's unemployed son's furniture business, the Court articulated the governing principle: there is no bar which can restrict a landlord from the beneficial enjoyment of his own property, and a tenant - or indeed the court - cannot dictate how and in what manner the landlord should live or organise his affairs. The landlord settles his life and arranges his business in his own way, and that choice cannot be guided, controlled or restricted by any third person, including the court. While the Court balanced equities by awarding the long-standing tenant compensation, the ratio firmly establishes that genuine personal requirement, once demonstrated, is a sufficient and largely unchallengeable basis for recovery of possession under the 2021 scheme.
Efflux of time and tenant-initiated grounds: (j), (g) and (k)
Because the 2021 Act is built on fixed-term written tenancies, ground (j) is a natural consequence: the tenancy may be terminated and possession recovered on the determination of the tenancy by efflux of time, that is, expiry of the agreed period under Section 5. Section 5(3) reinforces this by making a holding-over tenant liable to enhanced rent under Section 23. Ground (g) is tenant-triggered: where the tenant has given written notice to vacate and, in consequence, the landlord has contracted to sell the premises or taken other steps that would cause him serious prejudice if possession were not delivered. Ground (k) permits eviction where the tenant has allowed the premises to be occupied by a person who is not a member of his family - the Act defining family to include spouse, lineal descendants, parents, and unmarried or widowed daughters and daughters-in-law. Ground (k) is in substance a refinement of the parting-with-possession theme in ground (c): the legislature recognises that a tenant must be allowed to house his own family, but treats occupation by a stranger as a breach of the personal character of the tenancy. Read together, grounds (g), (j) and (k) confirm that the 2021 Act treats the tenancy as a defined-term, personal arrangement rather than an open-ended interest in land, so that expiry of the term, the tenant's own election to leave, or his admission of an outsider each ripens into a recoverable ground.
Relief against forfeiture: Section 21(3) to (5)
The arrears ground is tempered by a statutory relief-against-forfeiture scheme. Under Section 21(3), an order of eviction for non-payment of rent is barred if the tenant pays or deposits the arrears of rent and other charges, with interest, within one month from the date of service of the notice of demand. This is the tenant's safety valve: prompt payment defeats the cause of action under ground (b) entirely. Section 21(4) prevents abuse of that indulgence - the relief is not available again if, within one year of obtaining it, the tenant once more defaults in payment for two consecutive months. Section 21(5) permits the Rent Authority to order eviction from only a part of the premises where the landlord so agrees, allowing a proportionate rather than wholesale remedy - useful, for example, where the landlord's repair or personal-use requirement extends only to a portion of a larger letting. Together these subsections show that the arrears ground is designed less to punish than to compel payment: the statute repeatedly hands the defaulting tenant a route back to compliance, while denying the chronic defaulter repeated indulgence. This calibrated approach distinguishes the money grounds from the building and personal-use grounds, which admit of no equivalent cure once the landlord's requirement or the tenant's structural breach is established.
Forum, procedure and appeal
Every eviction under Section 21 is decided by the Rent Authority, not a civil court; Section 38 bars the jurisdiction of civil courts over matters the Rent Authority and Rent Tribunal are empowered to decide. An order of the Rent Authority is appealable to the Rent Tribunal under Section 35 within thirty days, but the appeal carries a significant filter - a pre-deposit of fifty per cent of the entire payable amount is mandatory for institution of the appeal. The Rent Tribunal, constituted under Section 32 and presided over by the District Judge or a nominated Additional District Judge, may confirm, set aside or modify the Rent Authority's order. Because the Tribunal functions as a civil court and its orders are judicial, the Allahabad High Court has held that they are amenable to challenge only under the supervisory jurisdiction of Article 227 of the Constitution - not by way of a first appeal to the High Court - keeping the eviction process within a tight, specialised channel.
Exam takeaways
For judiciary and CLAT-PG examinees, three points carry disproportionate weight. First, Section 21(2) is an exhaustive list - memorise the grouping (money: a, b; transfers: c, i; misuse: d; building: e, f, h, m; tenant-driven: g, j, k, l). Second, the notice requirement is clause-specific, not general: per Mahesh Chandra Agarwal, prior notice attaches to grounds (b), (d) and (g) but emphatically not to the personal-use ground (m). Third, the personal-need ground under the 2021 Act is easier for landlords than under the 1972 Act - per Vijay Kumar Banswar, the landlord need only show the premises are required, not strict bona fide necessity, and the court will not second-guess how he chooses to enjoy his property. Pair these grounds with the relief-against-forfeiture safety valve in Section 21(3) and the 50% pre-deposit appeal filter in Section 35, and you have the full eviction picture under the statute. See also the security-deposit cap and the core definitions that frame who may sue whom.
Frequently asked questions
Are the grounds for eviction under Section 21(2) exhaustive?
Yes. Section 21(1) protects a tenant from eviction during the tenancy except in accordance with the grounds listed in Section 21(2) or recovery under Section 22. A landlord cannot rely on a ground outside the statutory list, and the Rent Authority cannot order eviction on an unpleaded ground.
Is prior notice to the tenant required before filing every eviction application?
No. In Mahesh Chandra Agarwal v. Rent Tribunal (Allahabad HC, 8 January 2024, 2024:AHC-LKO:2011) the Court held that prior notice is required only where the relevant clause expressly says so - principally grounds (b) arrears, (d) continued misuse, and (g). It is not required for ground (m), the landlord's personal use.
How much arrears default justifies eviction under ground (b)?
Non-payment of rent and other charges for two consecutive months, where the tenant fails to clear the demanded arrears with interest within one month of service of a notice of demand. For armed-forces members the default period is extended to one year instead of two months.
Can a tenant avoid eviction for arrears by paying up?
Yes. Section 21(3) bars an eviction order for non-payment if the tenant pays or deposits the arrears with interest within one month of the notice of demand. However, under Section 21(4) this relief is unavailable a second time if the tenant defaults again for two consecutive months within the following year.
Does the landlord have to prove bona fide necessity for personal-use eviction?
Under the 2021 Act the burden is lighter than under the 1972 Act. Per Vijay Kumar Banswar v. Awadesh Kumar Jaiswal (Allahabad HC, 23 November 2023), the landlord need only demonstrate that the premises are required by him; there is no bar on a landlord's beneficial enjoyment of his own property, and a tenant or court cannot dictate how he organises his affairs.
What is the forum and appeal route for an eviction order?
The Rent Authority decides eviction applications; civil court jurisdiction is barred by Section 38. An appeal lies to the Rent Tribunal under Section 35 within thirty days, subject to a mandatory pre-deposit of 50% of the payable amount. Tribunal orders are challengeable before the High Court only under Article 227.