# Model Tenancy Act and rent agreement rules 2026: a guide **TL;DR:** The Model Tenancy Act, 2021 is a template the Centre wrote and sent to every state, not a law that binds anyone on its own. It caps the security deposit at two months' rent for a home and six months' rent for a shop or office, requires a written tenancy agreement filed with a Rent Authority, gives you a 24-hour notice rule before a landlord can enter, and bars eviction except through a Rent Court order. Disputes go to a three-tier system of Rent Authority, Rent Court, and Rent Tribunal, with civil courts shut out of most tenancy matters. But here is the catch that decides whether any of this protects you: only four states have actually adopted it, namely Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, and Assam. Everywhere else, your old state rent-control law still rules. This guide walks through every provision, the section numbers, and the gap between what the Act promises and what your address actually delivers. --- ## On this page - [What the Model Tenancy Act actually is](#what-the-model-tenancy-act-actually-is) - [The vacancy paradox the Act tries to fix](#the-vacancy-paradox-the-act-tries-to-fix) - [Which states have adopted it, and why your address decides everything](#which-states-have-adopted-it-and-why-your-address-decides-everything) - [The written agreement and registration with the Rent Authority](#the-written-agreement-and-registration-with-the-rent-authority) - [Security deposit caps: two months and six months](#security-deposit-caps-two-months-and-six-months) - [Entry, privacy, and the 24-hour notice rule](#entry-privacy-and-the-24-hour-notice-rule) - [How eviction works, and why forcible eviction is barred](#how-eviction-works-and-why-forcible-eviction-is-barred) - [What happens if a tenant does not vacate](#what-happens-if-a-tenant-does-not-vacate) - [The dispute path: Rent Authority, Rent Court, Rent Tribunal](#the-dispute-path-rent-authority-rent-court-rent-tribunal) - [Old versus new: rent control against the Model Tenancy Act](#old-versus-new-rent-control-against-the-model-tenancy-act) - [Where the Act falls short](#where-the-act-falls-short) - [How Niyam helps you research tenancy law](#how-niyam-helps-you-research-tenancy-law) - [Frequently asked questions](#frequently-asked-questions) --- ## What the Model Tenancy Act actually is Start with the word that does all the work: "model." The Model Tenancy Act is a template. The Union Cabinet approved it on 2 June 2021, and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs sent it to every state and union territory on 7 June 2021, asking them to enact it or amend their existing rent laws to match. The full text and a clause-by-clause summary sit on [PRS Legislative Research's tracker for the Model Tenancy Act, 2021](https://prsindia.org/billtrack/the-model-tenancy-act-2021). It is not a central statute that runs across India. It cannot be, and the reason is constitutional. Land and the rights over it fall in the State List of the Seventh Schedule, so Parliament has no power to pass a rent law that binds Mumbai or Bengaluru directly. The Centre can only draft a model and hope the states pick it up. That single fact, that the Act is advisory, is the most important thing a tenant or landlord can know about it. So when you read a headline saying a new rent law has changed your rights, pause. A widely shared claim in 2025 about a freshly notified central "Rent Agreement Act" was checked and found false. As the [LawStreet Journal fact-check confirmed, the Centre has not notified any new rent law](https://lawstreet.co/executive/fact-check-centre-has-not-notified-any-new-rent-law-claims-of-a-new-rent-agreement-act-2025-baseless), and the Model Tenancy Act remains exactly what it was in 2021: a model awaiting state adoption. That does not make it irrelevant. Where a state has adopted it, the Act rewrites the relationship between owner and renter in ways the old rent-control laws never did. And even where a state has not adopted it, the Model Act is shaping how newer agreements are drafted, because tenants and landlords increasingly want its balance of protections written into their contracts by choice. --- ## The vacancy paradox the Act tries to fix To see why the Act exists, look at a contradiction that has sat in Indian cities for years. The country has a housing shortage and a glut of empty homes at the same time. Census 2011 counted nearly 1.1 crore vacant houses in urban areas. The Technical Group on Urban Housing Shortage estimated a shortage of around 1.88 crore urban homes for the same period. Both numbers are cited together in the [IMPRI policy analysis of the Model Tenancy Act](https://www.impriindia.com/insights/policy-update/the-model-tenancy-act-21/). Read them next to each other and the puzzle is obvious. Millions of families need housing, millions of homes sit locked, and the two never meet. The reason is fear. Old rent-control laws, many of them framed in the decades after Independence, froze rents at "standard" or "fair" levels and made eviction so slow and uncertain that owners stopped trusting the system. A landlord who lets out a flat worries the tenant will never leave, or will pay a rent frozen at 1970s levels while the courts take a generation to decide. So the rational owner keeps the flat empty. Researchers at the Centre for Social and Economic Progress describe this directly in their study of [India's housing vacancy paradox, where rent control and weak contract enforcement produce empty units and a shortage at once](https://csep.org/working-paper/indias-housing-vacancy-paradox/). The Model Tenancy Act is an attempt to break that fear. By giving both sides a written contract, a quick dispute forum, and a clear exit, it tries to make owners willing to rent again. The economics behind that bet are set out at length in the [USC Lusk working paper on vacant housing in India](https://lusk.usc.edu/sites/default/files/working_papers/Vacant_Housing_India_6-25.pdf), which links restrictive tenancy law to the supply of homes that never reach the market. Whether the Act succeeds depends entirely on adoption, which brings us to the part most articles skip. --- ## Which states have adopted it, and why your address decides everything Here is the line that matters more than any provision below: the Model Tenancy Act protects you only if the state where your property sits has adopted it. As of the latest data from the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, four states have notified the Model Tenancy Act or aligned their law to it. They are Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, and Assam. This count is reflected across independent summaries, including the [Drishti IAS analysis of the Model Tenancy Act](https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-updates/daily-news-analysis/model-tenancy-act-2). Four states, more than three years after the model was circulated. That is the real story of the Act. Everywhere else, the older law governs. A tenant in Maharashtra is still under the Maharashtra Rent Control Act, 1999. A tenant in Delhi is under the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958. The deposit caps, the entry rules, and the Rent Court structure described in this guide simply do not apply in those states until and unless they legislate. You can sign a private agreement that copies the Model Act's terms, and that contract binds the parties to each other, but you do not get the statutory machinery, the Rent Authority, or the fast-track tribunal. There is a second timing limit even inside the four adopting states. The Act applies prospectively. It governs tenancies created after the state's adoption, not agreements already running. So an old tenancy from 2015 in Uttar Pradesh does not automatically convert to the new regime. This prospective-only design is one of the Act's most criticised features, a point the [SCC Online analysis of the Model Tenancy Act](https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2021/10/07/the-model-tenancy-act-2021-a-step-forward/) makes plainly when it calls the Act "a mixed bag" for owners stuck in long-running old tenancies. The practical takeaway is simple. Before you rely on a single right in this guide, confirm two things. First, has your state adopted the Model Tenancy Act? Second, was your tenancy created after that adoption? If either answer is no, your rights come from your state's own rent statute, not from this model. --- ## The written agreement and registration with the Rent Authority The Act's first big move is to make the handshake illegal. Under Section 4, no tenancy is valid unless it rests on a written agreement, and the agreement must be filed with the Rent Authority. The verbal "leave and licence" understanding that runs so many Indian rentals has no standing under the Act. The mechanics are these. Within two months of signing, the landlord and tenant must jointly submit the agreement and the prescribed information to the Rent Authority of the district. The Authority registers it and issues a unique identification number. The information filed becomes conclusive proof of the terms of the tenancy, which means neither side can later claim the rent was something else or the term was longer. The clause-level treatment is in the [PRS summary of the Model Tenancy Act](https://prsindia.org/billtrack/the-model-tenancy-act-2021). This is more protective than it first looks. In a dispute under the old system, the hardest fight is often about what was agreed at all, because nothing is on paper. The Act removes that fight. The registered agreement is the record, and the Rent Authority holds it. The written agreement must spell out the core terms: the rent, the period of tenancy, how and when rent may be revised, the security deposit, the reasonable grounds on which the landlord may enter, and who is responsible for which repairs. If you are drafting one, this is also the moment to get the notice and termination clauses right, and the discipline of [how to draft a clean legal notice](/blog/how-to-draft-legal-notice) carries over to drafting the tenancy itself, because vague wording is what tribunals fight over for years. Registration also matters for a reason that bites later. The Act ties relief to registration. If the tenancy was never filed with the Rent Authority, a party may find the door to the Act's remedies closed. The written, registered agreement is not paperwork for its own sake. It is the key that unlocks every protection that follows. --- ## Security deposit caps: two months and six months This is the provision tenants ask about most, and the one with the cleanest answer. Section 11 of the Model Tenancy Act caps the security deposit. For residential premises, the deposit cannot exceed two months' rent. For non-residential premises, meaning a shop, office, or other commercial space, the cap is six months' rent. These figures are confirmed across the [PRS tracker](https://prsindia.org/billtrack/the-model-tenancy-act-2021) and the [SCC Online analysis](https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2021/10/07/the-model-tenancy-act-2021-a-step-forward/). Why this matters so much depends on where you live. In several metros, especially Bengaluru, landlords have for years demanded six, eight, even ten months' rent as deposit, locking up money many young renters do not have. A two-month cap changes the entry cost of renting completely. As Apurva Agarwal, Founder of Universal Legal, told Business Today, the cap "dramatically lowers the entry cost for tenants and makes renting more accessible for young professionals and migrants," a point reported in the [Business Today explainer on the Model Tenancy Act's deposit and exit rules](https://www.businesstoday.in/personal-finance/real-estate/story/model-tenancy-act-how-new-security-deposits-rent-agreement-entry-exit-rules-will-benefit-tenants-landlords-504839-2025-12-03). The Act also fixes the back end of the deposit. The landlord must refund it to the tenant at the time of taking back vacant possession, after deducting any legitimate dues such as unpaid rent or the cost of repairing damage the tenant caused. The deposit is not the landlord's to keep against vague grievances. It is the tenant's money, held in trust, returnable on exit minus what is genuinely owed. One honest caveat. The two-month figure is the statutory cap inside an adopting state. If your state has not adopted the Act, there is no statutory cap on your deposit, and the market sets it. A renter in a non-adopting state who wants the protection has to negotiate it into the private agreement, because the law will not supply it. --- ## Entry, privacy, and the 24-hour notice rule A landlord owns the property. The Act recognises that the tenant, while the tenancy runs, owns the right to be left alone in it. The Act requires the landlord to give 24 hours' prior notice before entering the rented premises, and the entry must be for a reasonable purpose, such as carrying out repairs or inspection. This is stated directly in the [Drishti IAS summary](https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-updates/daily-news-analysis/model-tenancy-act-2). The landlord cannot walk in unannounced, and cannot use a spare key as a standing right of access. There is a further restriction on timing. As set out in the [Factly explainer on the Model Tenancy Act's provisions](https://factly.in/explainer-what-are-the-important-provisions-of-the-model-tenancy-act-2021/), the landlord cannot enter the premises before sunrise or after sunset. The combination, advance notice plus daylight-only entry, turns the tenant's home into something the law treats as private space rather than the owner's open property. The notice can be written or electronic, which in practice means a message or email is enough, so long as it gives the tenant the full day's warning and states the reason. Genuine emergencies are the exception. Where a fire, flood, or similar danger threatens the premises, the landlord may enter without the 24-hour notice, because the purpose of the rule is to protect privacy, not to leave a building to burn. For tenants used to landlords who treat a rented flat as their own to inspect at will, this is a real shift in the balance of power. For landlords, it is a reminder that letting a property transfers possession, and possession carries the right to privacy that the Act now backs with a forum to enforce it. --- ## How eviction works, and why forcible eviction is barred This is the heart of the Act, and the part that most changes the old culture of renting. Under the Model Tenancy Act, a landlord cannot simply throw a tenant out. Forcible or summary eviction, changing the locks, cutting the power, removing belongings, is not a remedy the Act allows. Eviction happens one way only: by an order of the Rent Court, after the landlord applies and proves a ground listed in the Act. The grounds are set out in Section 21(2), as detailed in the [SCC Online analysis](https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2021/10/07/the-model-tenancy-act-2021-a-step-forward/). Those grounds include non-payment of rent, where the tenant has not paid for more than two months despite notice; subletting or parting with possession of part or all of the premises without the landlord's written consent; misuse of the premises despite a written warning; the landlord's genuine need to carry out repairs or rebuilding that require the premises to be vacated; and making structural changes without consent. Each ground has to be pleaded and proved. The Rent Court does not rubber-stamp an eviction. There is a deliberate, and debated, omission. The Act does not give the landlord a general "bona fide personal need" ground to recover the premises for the family's own use during a running tenancy, except in the narrow case of legal heirs after the landlord's death under Section 22. Many landlords expected the new law to make it easy to take back a flat for a returning son or an ageing parent. It does not, at least not while the agreed tenancy term runs. Equally, the tenant is not free to defy the system. The Act protects against arbitrary eviction, not against lawful eviction. A tenant who stops paying, sublets without consent, or wrecks the premises can be removed through the Rent Court, and the process is meant to be quick rather than the decades-long ordeal of the old rent-control courts. The point is procedure. Eviction is real, but it runs through a tribunal, not through a landlord's muscle. If you receive a notice and want to understand the document before you respond, our guide on [how to draft a legal notice](/blog/how-to-draft-legal-notice) explains the form these communications take. --- ## What happens if a tenant does not vacate The Act is just as firm on the other side. A tenant who refuses to leave after the tenancy has lawfully ended pays a steep price. Section 23 deals with the tenant who holds over, meaning one who stays on after the term expires or after a valid termination by notice or order. The compensation is graduated. For the first two months, the tenant must pay twice the monthly rent. After that, for as long as the tenant continues to occupy the premises, the rate rises to four times the monthly rent. The structure of Section 23 is set out in the [SCC Online analysis](https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2021/10/07/the-model-tenancy-act-2021-a-step-forward/) and the [PRS summary](https://prsindia.org/billtrack/the-model-tenancy-act-2021). The logic is to make squatting expensive. Under the old rent-control regime, a tenant who refused to go often paid the same frozen rent while the case dragged through court, so there was no financial reason to leave. Doubling the rent immediately, and quadrupling it within two months, flips that incentive. The longer the tenant overstays, the faster the bill grows, and the compensation accrues automatically without the landlord having to prove a separate loss. This single provision is part of why the Act is meant to coax owners back into renting. It tells a landlord that even in the worst case, an overstaying tenant becomes a paying problem on a rising scale rather than a frozen liability. Read alongside the deposit refund rules and the Rent Court eviction path, Section 23 completes a design that tries to be fair to both sides instead of tilting permanently toward one. --- ## The dispute path: Rent Authority, Rent Court, Rent Tribunal The Act builds its own machinery to decide tenancy fights, and it pushes the regular civil courts out of the way. There are three tiers. The first is the **Rent Authority**, an officer not below the rank of Deputy Collector, who registers tenancy agreements and decides first-level disputes such as rent revision and the wrongful cutting of essential services. The second is the **Rent Court**, presided over by an Additional Collector or Additional District Magistrate, which hears eviction applications and appeals from the Rent Authority. The third is the **Rent Tribunal**, headed by a District Judge or Additional District Judge, which is the final appellate body. The structure runs across Sections 30 to 37 and is summarised in the [PRS tracker](https://prsindia.org/billtrack/the-model-tenancy-act-2021). Speed is built into the design. The Act sets a 60-day target for the Rent Authority, Rent Court, and Rent Tribunal to decide cases before them, and if a forum misses that deadline it must record in writing the reasons for the delay. A 60-day mandate, even an aspirational one, is a different universe from the rent-control litigation that routinely outlived the original parties. The Act also closes the civil court door. Section 40 bars civil courts from entertaining suits on matters the Rent Court or Rent Authority is empowered to decide, while preserving questions of title for the civil court. This exclusion is meant to stop the forum-shopping and parallel litigation that clog the old system, and it is worth understanding against the backdrop of ordinary civil procedure, which our primer on [the basics of the Code of Civil Procedure](/blog/cpc-civil-procedure-basics) sets out. For disputes that suit a negotiated outcome rather than adjudication, the wider shift toward structured settlement under the [Mediation Act, 2023](/blog/mediation-act-2023) and the long-standing role of [Lok Adalats in clearing pending matters](/blog/lok-adalat-explained) sit alongside this tribunal route as faster alternatives. There is also an essential-services safeguard worth flagging. A landlord cannot cut off water, electricity, sanitation, or other essential supplies to force a tenant out. If a landlord does, the Rent Authority can order restoration and award the tenant compensation of up to two months' rent, a protection described in [ThePrint's explainer on what the Model Tenancy Act changes for tenants and landlords](https://theprint.in/theprint-essential/rent-security-maintenance-what-could-change-for-tenant-landlord-under-model-tenancy-act/671876/). --- ## Old versus new: rent control against the Model Tenancy Act The cleanest way to see what the Act changes is to put it next to the rent-control regime it is meant to replace. The contrast below describes adopting states. In non-adopting states, the left column still governs. | Feature | Old rent-control law | Model Tenancy Act, 2021 (where adopted) | | --- | --- | --- | | Written agreement required | ✗ Verbal tenancies common | ✓ Mandatory under Section 4, filed with Rent Authority | | Security deposit cap | ✗ Set by the market, often 6 to 10 months | ✓ 2 months (residential), 6 months (commercial) under Section 11 | | Rent fixing | ✗ "Standard" or "fair" rent, often frozen | ✓ Rent follows the agreement; no fair-rent ceiling | | Notice before landlord entry | ✗ No statutory rule | ✓ 24 hours' notice, daylight only | | Forcible eviction | ✗ Sometimes attempted with impunity | ✓ Barred; eviction only by Rent Court order | | Holding-over penalty | ✗ Often the same frozen rent | ✓ 2x rent for 2 months, then 4x under Section 23 | | Dispute forum | ✗ Crowded civil courts, years of delay | ✓ Rent Authority, Court, Tribunal with 60-day target | | Cutting essential services | ✗ Used as pressure tactic | ✓ Prohibited; Authority can order restoration and compensation | Read down the table and the design is clear. The Act trades the frozen-rent protection of the old system, which scared owners away, for a contract-based balance: market rent, but with a deposit cap, a privacy rule, a fast forum, and a hard bar on self-help eviction. Whether that trade favours the tenant or the landlord depends on the case. What is not in doubt is that it is a sharper, more predictable framework than the one it replaces. --- ## Where the Act falls short A fair guide names the weaknesses, and the Model Tenancy Act has real ones. The first is adoption, and it dwarfs the rest. Four states in more than three years is not a national reform. Until the large rental markets of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Delhi, and West Bengal legislate, most Indian tenants and landlords live entirely outside the Act, and the protections in this guide are aspirational for them. The [IMPRI analysis](https://www.impriindia.com/insights/policy-update/the-model-tenancy-act-21/) treats slow uptake as the central limitation on the Act's promise. The second is the prospective-only design. Because the Act does not touch existing tenancies, the very disputes that have rotted in rent-control courts for decades, the frozen-rent legacy cases, get no relief. The reform reaches new agreements and leaves the old backlog untouched. This is the "mixed bag" that the [SCC Online analysis](https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2021/10/07/the-model-tenancy-act-2021-a-step-forward/) flags for landlords still waiting on old tenancies. The third is the missing bona fide personal-need ground. Landlords who expected the new law to let them recover a flat for their own family during a running tenancy will find that the Act, by design, does not provide it outside the legal-heir situation in Section 22. Reasonable people disagree on whether that is a flaw or a feature, but owners should know it before they let out a property expecting easy recovery. The fourth is administrative. The whole structure depends on each district actually setting up a functioning Rent Authority, staffing the Rent Courts, and hitting the 60-day target. A statute can mandate speed; it cannot conjure judges and clerks. The 60-day deadline is a promise on paper until the machinery exists on the ground, and the early experience suggests building that machinery is slower than passing the law. None of this makes the Act a failure. It makes it a well-drafted model whose value is locked behind state action that has mostly not arrived. For now, the honest answer to "does the Model Tenancy Act protect me" is almost always "it depends on where you live." --- ## How Niyam helps you research tenancy law Tenancy law in India is not one law. It is a model template plus dozens of state rent statutes, each with its own deposit rules, eviction grounds, and forum, and the answer to any real question turns on which one applies to your address and your dates. That is exactly the kind of layered, jurisdiction-specific research that goes wrong when you ask a generic chatbot, because it will happily blend the Model Act with a state law that never adopted it. [Niyam](https://app.niyam.ai/register) is built for Indian legal research that stays grounded in real sources. Ask a question in plain language, such as "what is the security deposit cap in Tamil Nadu under the Model Tenancy Act" or "can a landlord evict without a Rent Court order in Uttar Pradesh," and Niyam answers with the relevant statute and the judgments that interpret it, every proposition tied to a source you can open and read. When a tenancy fight reaches court, the controlling authority is usually a High Court or Supreme Court ruling, and our note on [how Niyam helps with Indian legal research](/blog/ai-legal-research-india) explains how the platform surfaces those decisions. Before you rely on any precedent in a tenancy matter, [check whether it is still good law](/blog/good-law-checking), because rent-control jurisprudence is old and parts of it have been overtaken. Indian legal research should be fast, precise, and built on sources you can verify, not on a model answer that ignores whether your state ever adopted the model. ### Start for ₹100 Try Niyam on your next tenancy question. For ₹100 you get credits to run real research grounded in Indian statutes and judgments, with every answer cited to a source you can read. [Create your account and start for ₹100](https://app.niyam.ai/register). --- ## Frequently asked questions **Is the Model Tenancy Act law across all of India?** No. It is a model template the Centre drafted and circulated to the states on 7 June 2021. Land and tenancy are state subjects, so the Act binds no one until a state adopts it. As of the latest data, only Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, and Assam have notified it. In every other state, the old state rent-control law continues to govern. **What is the maximum security deposit under the Model Tenancy Act?** Section 11 caps the deposit at two months' rent for a residential property and six months' rent for a non-residential or commercial property. The landlord must refund the deposit when the tenant hands back vacant possession, after deducting any legitimate dues. These caps apply only in states that have adopted the Act. **Can a landlord enter the rented house whenever they want?** No. Where the Act applies, the landlord must give 24 hours' prior notice before entering, and only for a reasonable purpose such as repairs or inspection. Entry is not allowed before sunrise or after sunset. Genuine emergencies, such as a fire or flood, are the exception and do not require notice. **Can a landlord forcibly evict a tenant under the Model Tenancy Act?** No. Forcible or summary eviction is barred. A tenant can be evicted only by an order of the Rent Court, after the landlord proves a ground listed in Section 21(2), such as non-payment of rent for more than two months, unauthorised subletting, or misuse of the premises. Cutting off water or electricity to force a tenant out is prohibited. **What happens if a tenant does not leave after the tenancy ends?** Section 23 makes overstaying expensive. The tenant must pay twice the monthly rent for the first two months and four times the monthly rent for every month after that, for as long as they continue to occupy the premises. The compensation accrues automatically until the tenant vacates. **Does the Model Tenancy Act apply to my existing rent agreement?** Generally no. The Act applies prospectively to tenancies created after a state adopts it. An agreement already running before adoption stays under the earlier law. This is one of the Act's most criticised limitations, because it leaves long-pending old rent-control disputes untouched. **Is a written rent agreement compulsory?** Under the Act, yes. Section 4 requires every tenancy to be in writing, and the agreement must be filed with the Rent Authority within two months, after which it gets a unique identification number. The registered information is treated as conclusive proof of the tenancy terms, and the absence of registration can bar a party from the Act's remedies. **Who resolves tenancy disputes under the Act?** A three-tier system. The Rent Authority, an officer of at least Deputy Collector rank, handles registration and first-level disputes. The Rent Court, headed by an Additional Collector or Additional District Magistrate, decides evictions and appeals. The Rent Tribunal, headed by a District Judge, is the final appellate forum. Each is meant to decide cases within 60 days, and Section 40 bars civil courts from most tenancy matters while preserving title disputes for them. **Can the rent be increased during the tenancy?** The Act abolishes the old idea of "standard" or "fair" rent. Rent and its revision follow what the parties agreed in the written tenancy agreement. Any dispute over revision goes to the Rent Authority. This is why getting the rent-revision clause right in the agreement matters so much. **Does the Model Tenancy Act cover commercial premises?** Yes. It applies to both residential and non-residential premises, with the higher six-month deposit cap for non-residential property. It does not, however, cover certain premises such as those owned by the government or public companies, or used for specified public purposes, which are excluded from its scope. **What can a tenant do if the landlord cuts off water or electricity?** The tenant can approach the Rent Authority, which can pass an interim order directing restoration of the essential services and then hold an enquiry. If the cut-off is found wrongful, the Authority can order restoration and award the tenant compensation of up to two months' rent, payable by whoever withheld the supply. **Has a new central rent law been passed in 2025 or 2026?** No. Claims of a freshly notified central "Rent Agreement Act" in 2025 were fact-checked and found false. The Model Tenancy Act, 2021 remains the only central framework, and it is still a model awaiting state adoption rather than a binding national statute. **If my state has not adopted the Act, can I still use its terms?** You can copy its protections into a private agreement, such as a two-month deposit cap or a 24-hour entry notice, and that contract binds you and the other party to each other. What you do not get is the statutory machinery: the Rent Authority, the fast-track Rent Court, and the 60-day disposal mandate exist only where the state has enacted the Act.