Telangana High Court rules landlord must prove tenancy before eviction

The Telangana High Court set aside an eviction order against a woman in a property dispute that lasted nearly 19 years.

The court ruled that a landlord cannot rely on a simple visual comparison of signatures to prove a tenancy agreement exists. Kothapalli Madhusudhan Rao initiated the dispute in 2007 by seeking to evict S Shashi Rekha from a building in West Marredpally, Secunderabad.

Rao claimed that Rekha failed to pay 20 months of rent and maintenance fees totaling Rs 56,000. Rekha denied signing the rental agreement, stating that her mother, Venkatamma, was the actual tenant and had agreed to purchase the property from Rao. A lower court had previously dismissed Rao's petition in 2011 because he failed to prove the tenancy. However, a 2017 judgment from the City Small Causes Court in Hyderabad reversed that decision.

That court compared the signature on the disputed agreement to Rekha's signatures on other documents and found them similar, ordering her to vacate the premises. Justice Vakiti Ramakrishna Reddy of the Telangana High Court overturned the 2017 ruling. The judge stated that the burden of proof lies with the person claiming the agreement is valid. The court noted that Rao failed to provide rent receipts or a handwriting expert's opinion.

The court also pointed out that Rao eventually agreed to sell the property to Venkatamma, and a sale deed was executed in her name in 2024. The court allowed Rekha to withdraw Rs 1 lakh she had deposited during the proceedings.