TMI Blog1924 (6) TMI 7X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ereafter. The third child of Hanmanna was another son, Hamanna since deceased. Ramanna married Chanbasava; they had no children, but they adopted as a son, Parappa. He died a month after Ramanna. Thereupon, his adoptive mother Chanbasava succeeded to the property for the ordinary Hindu woman's estate, and upon her death, descent would have to be traced to Parappa as the propositus; and Hanmappa if he survived Chanbasava would be the natural heir to Parappa. 2. The relationships can be illustrated on a genealogical table, thus :-- 3. In 1914, Hanmappa had a quarrel with his aunt Chanbasava and murdered her. He was tried and sentenced to transportation for life. The matter to be determined in this case is who, in these circumst ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... isqualification of the murderer, but wiped him out from the line of descent, so that the heirship to the propositus Parappa is to be traced directly and not through him. 7. The High Court came to the same conclusions, that is to say, that the murderer had no title, and that the heirship was not to he traced through him, but on a somewhat different line of reasoning. The learned Judges thought that there was no Hindu law which governed the matter, so that they had to have recourse in obedience to the Bombay Regulation of 1827, No. 4, S. 26, to the principles of equity, justice and good conscience. And while thinking it immaterial whether the murderer had the legal estate vested in him or not because in either case he must for the purpos ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... n (1915) 2 Ch. 173 thought it a matter for consideration whether the same rule would apply in the case of an intestacy, and cited a decision of a Court in the U. S. A. by which it was held that the provisions of the Statute of Distributions were paramount and forbade the consideration of any disqualification. But the actual decision of Joyce, J. was rested upon another ground and a quite satisfactory one; and their Lordships are unlable to follow the reasoning of the learned American Judge. Statutes regulating heirship or descent, or giving force to wills and to the devises contained in wills should be read as not intended to affect paramount questions of public policy or depart from well-settled principles of jurisprudence. 11. In their ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... er husband, but because of the principle of Hindu family law that a wife becomes a member of her husband's gotra, an actual relation of her husband's relations in her own right, as it is called in Hindu law a gotraja-sapinda. The decision therefore has no bearing on the present case. 14. It remains to be determined whether as between the appellants and the respondent--all three being first cousins of the propositus--any distinction is to be made by reason of their sex or the sex of their parents. The Subordinate Judge thought that there was no distinction to be made between bandhus of equal nearness, and that all took equally, and so he gave to the plaintiff a third of the property. 15. Both parties appealed to the High Court, ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ister was postponed to a mother's brother by reason of the general preference given among bandhus to male over female heirs This decision was quoted without disapproval by their Lordships on this Board in the case of Vedachela Mudaliar v. Subramania Mudaliar AIR. 1922 P.C. 33 = 44 Mad. 753 = 48 I.A. 349 = 14 L.W. 402 = 2 Pat. L. T. 707 = 41 M.L.J. 676 = (1921) M. W. N. 669 = 26 C.W.N. 159 (P.C.). 19. But the High Court of Bombay in 1902 in the case of Sagunna v. Sadashiv (1902) 26 Bom. 710 = 4 Bom. L.R. 527 came to the conclusion that however this might be in Madras it was different in Bombay. The Judges gave preference to the father's half sister over the mother's brother, and did not follow the case of Narasimma v. Mangamma ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... 26 Bom. 710 = 4 Bom. L.R. 527 was not referred to in the judgment, but it was unnecessary because there was no contest between maternal and paternal bandhus. 24. Then in Balkrishna v. Ramkrishna A. I. R. 1921 Bom. 189 = 45 Bom. 353 = 22 Bom. L.R. 1442 decided in 1920 by the High Court of Bombay--consisting of the same Judges who decided the case now under appeal the authority of Rajah Venkata Narasimha v. Rajah Surenani (1908) 31 Mad. 321 - 18 M.L.J. 409 = A. M. L. T. 5 was followed. The principle that among bandhus the male is entitled to preference over the female--even though the latter is nearer in degree was accepted as being law for the Bombay Presidency as much as for the Madras Presidency ; and preference was given to a mother&# ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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