Shahareen Begum

On the court record

A contract- and tenancy-litigation practice recorded at first instance and on appeal, turning on the construction of settlement and tenancy agreements and the boundary between claims for rent and claims in trespass.

Shahareen Begum is recorded in the corpus in contract and property-related litigation, at first instance and on appeal. In a High Court matter the firm acted for the plaintiff, a public university, in a claim against a flight-training company then in liquidation for breach of an oral settlement agreement under which the company had failed to supply the agreed flight training; the court found that the company had breached the Perjanjian Penyelesaian Lisan (oral settlement agreement) and was liable, and that the plaintiff had succeeded on the balance of probabilities, recording that tuntutan Plaintif dibenarkan dengan kos (the plaintiff's claim was allowed with costs). A linked pair of Court of Appeal matters, again with the firm on the plaintiff's side, arose from a tenancy dispute between a developer and a trading company over two rented lots: the cross-appeals engaged whether the plaintiff had a cause of action under the tenancy agreement for alleged overdue rental, and whether it was entitled to a claim in trespass, the judge below having allowed part of the trespass claim — specifically over an access road, up to the issuance of a Form K — while dismissing the balance, so that each side appealed the portion of the decision it found unfavourable. Across these matters the firm is recorded pursuing contractual and tenancy claims in which the pleaded rights turn on the construction of the underlying agreements and on the precise boundary between a contractual claim for rent and a tortious claim for trespass to land. The record reflects a practice comfortable establishing liability on a settlement or tenancy agreement at first instance and defending or extending that result through cross-appeals in the Court of Appeal, where partial success below often means both parties are before the appellate court. In the tenancy cross-appeals the trespass finding had been allowed only up to the issuance of a Form K over the access road, while the alternative claim over unidentifiable land was dismissed, framing the scope of each side's appeal.