9911796707
TMI Blog1933 (1) TMI 27X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... s amended by claiming reliefs as to other properties as well, but these claims are not the subject of this appeal as they failed before Put-Ian, J., the Trial Judge, and were given up at the hearing of the appeal in the Chief Court. Pullan, J., gave the plaintiff a declaration as to the adoption, and otherwise dismissed the suit. The Chief Court modified this decree by giving the plaintiff a declaration as to the deed of gift as well. From this decree the defendants have preferred the present appeal. 2. The following pedigree will help to show how the suit arose: 3. Hardat Singh, the Raja of Bondi, having taken an active part in the Mutiny, his estates, which had been confiscated under Lord Canning's Proclamation, were not restored to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... lder brother, was lambardar and manager of the estate until his death in 1896. Mutation of names was then effected as regards his share in favour of his minor son Swami Bakhsh Singh, and his surviving brother Mahabir Bakhsh Singh became lambardar and manager and so continued until his death in 1905. The minor Swami Bakhsh Singh died in 1899, and on his death mutation of names was effected in favour of his mother Bahu Rani, defendant 1 in this case, with the consent of her brother-in-law Mahabir Bakhsh Singh, whose name was entered as manager. 6. So far had everything proceeded on the footing that Mahesh Bakhsh Singh's share was his separate property and had descended on his death to his minor son Swami Bakhsh Singh and on his death to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... deed it was alleged that the present plaintiff neither had been nor could have been adopted by Mahabir Bakhsh Singh. 8. The plaintiff then instituted the present suit on 3rd May 1927, for a declaration that his adoption was valid and that the deed of gift executed by defendant 1 in favour of defendant 2 was not binding beyond her own lifetime. The written statements of the defendants alleged that there was a family custom prohibiting adoption, that the plaintiff had not been validly adopted, and that he was incapable of being adopted because his remote ancestor Sangaram was illegitimate as his mother was a Brahmin lady whom his father Harihar Deo could not lawfully marry. They also alleged that the suit villages were joint family property ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... s-constituted a joint family, the grants must be taken to have been made to them jointly as members of a joint family.. The limitation in the grants themselves which have been set out above he treated as a mere form and nothing more, which could not be taken as subversive of the ordinary rules of succession under the Hindu law. Accordingly he held that on the death of Swami Bakhsh Singh in 1899 his share passed by survivorship to his uncle, Mahabir Singh, and that defendant 1 had acquired a title thereto by adverse possession for more than 12 years, and rejected the plaintiff's claim to a declaration in respect of them. 11. On the plaintiff's appeal to the Chief Court it was contended for the defendants that the grants must be take ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... in the case of coparcenary between the members of an undivided family. In the second place the learned Judges misapprehended the law of England, because it is clear, according to that law, that a conveyance, or an agreement to convey his or her personal interest by one of the joint tenants, operates as severance. 12. In their Lordships' opinion this is a clear ruling that the principle of joint tenancy is unknown to Hindu law except in the case of the joint property of an undivided Hindu family governed by the Mitakshara law which under that law passes by survivorship. There could therefore be no question of these grants creating a joint tenancy as opposed to a tenancy in common, even if according to English law the terms of these inst ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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