Court : Chennai
Reported in : 43Ind.Cas.871
Sadasiva Aiyab, J.1. The question common to all these appeals is whether the Karvetinagar Estate is inalienable by virtue of its tenure or by a custom under which the Zamindar for the time being is prohibited from alienating any portion of the estate, except for purposes for which the manager of a joint Hindu family (not the father) is entitled as such manager to make valid alienations of the joint family property. On this question I might at once say that I agree with the judgment to be pronounced by my learned brother. As it was, however, argued with great strenuousness and persistence by Mr. Govindaraghava Aiyar for the appellant, I deem it appropriate to express my views on this point, in my own words. As regards inalienability by virtue of the tenure, as soon as the military tenure under which the properties were; held was put an end to, about 120 years ago, that is, when the British Government granted the lands to the Zamindav under a quite different tenure With express powers of...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : AIR1918Mad272; 43Ind.Cas.560; (1918)34MLJ258
John Wallis, C.J.1. This is an appeal from a decision of the Subordinate Judge of North Arcot, dismissing a suit by the plaintiff for redemption of the mortgage Ex. VII executed by the senior widow of the last male owner on the 27th February 1875, and also for a declaration that a lease executed by her previously on the 28th October 1874 (Ex. XIII) is not binding on the plaintiff. The plaintiff's suit was based on the alleged adoption of his father by the junior widow of the last male owner in the year 1879. The last male owner died about the year 1850 and there is really no evidence of any authority given by him to his widow to make the adoption. Another question which arises is whether one widow could adopt without the consent of the other widow and then there is the question whether the adoption was made with the consent of the sapindas. On the latter question the Subordinate Judge has found that it is not shown that the adoption was made either with the consent of the senior widow ...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : (1918)ILR41Mad620
Kumaraswami Sastriyar, J.1. We are of opinion that the District Munsif was not justified in determining a question of limitation as to which there has been considerable difference of judicial opinion upon an application to sue in forma pauperis. Order XXXIII, Rule 5(d), applies only to cases where the allegations of the petitioner do not show a cause of action and we think that this should appear clearly upon the face of the petition.2. We have been referred to cases where it was held that the Court can go into the question of limitation to see if the petitioner has a subsisting cause of action. The cases do not decide that an elaborate enquiry into doubtful and complicated questions of law should be raised at the stage contemplated by Order XXXIII, Rule 5. The pauper has no right of appeal if the decision on the question of law is wrong. We do not think it necessary to decide the question of limitation at this stage. This should form the subject matter of an issue.3. In the present ca...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : AIR1918Mad213; (1917)33MLJ566
Ayling, J.1. The question propounded for our decision is:Whether recourse can be had to the general provisions of Act IX of 1908 in dealing with the admission of petitions and appeals presented after the time prescribed under the provisions of the Provincial Insolvency Act III of 1907 ?2. The obstacle to the application of these general provisions isSection 29 of the same Act which says:Nothing in this Act shall...affect or after any period of limitation specially prescribed for any suit, appeal or application by any special or local law now or hereafter in force in British India. 3. The meaning of this section has been considered by a Full Bench of this Court in Abu Backer Sahib v. The Secretary of State for India I.L.R. (1909) M. 505 and in my opinion that judgment effectively answers the question before us. In place of Section 29 of Act IX of 1908 and the Provincial Insolvency Act, the learned Judges were dealing with Section 6 of Act XV of 1877 (the previous Limitation Act.)4. The ...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : 43Ind.Cas.155
Abdur Rahim, J.1. The decree-holder having purchased the property in dispute at an execution sale, which was confirmed on 16th January 1911, applied for delivery of possession by a petition presented on the 16th April 1915. If nothing further had happened, there could be no doubt that his application was out of time, applying to it Article 180 which was for the first time enacted in the new Limitation Act and lays down a period of three years for an application by a purchaser of immoveable property at a sale in execution of a decree for delivery of possession, reckoning time from the date when the sale becomes absolute. Previously, however, to the present application the respondent had made a similar application first on the 9th November 1912 and another on the 4th December 1912, and both these petitions were dismissed by one order on the 10th December 1912, on the ground that the purchaser was unable to identify the land. A third application was put in on the 4th July 1913. On that an...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : 43Ind.Cas.977
1. In this ease, the trustees of a temple in Tinnevelly District sued to eject the defendant from certain temple lands in her possession, alleging that she was a yearly tenant and that her tenancy was terminated by notice to quit. She pleaded in answer, inter alia, that she had a permanent occupancy right in the land and that plaintiffs were not entitled to eject her bat only to receive the thirvai due; she also pleaded a right of permanent tenancy acquired by adverse possession. The temple traced its title to an inam, grant by the Government in 1835. One of the questions in the case was whether the grant was only of the revenue payable to Government or of the land itself and as a result whether the Estates Land Act applied. The Munsif held that the grant was of the land itself and not of the revenue alone and that the Estates Land Act did not apply. He further held that the tenants in this and the connected suits were not shown to be yearly tenants liable to be ejected, or to have eve...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : AIR1918Mad93; 44Ind.Cas.519
1. The suit was in ejectment, and one of the questions before the lower Appellate Court was whether the land in dispute was the private land of the plaintiff or the ryoti land of the defendant. The District Munsif held in favour of the plaintiff, but, in appeal, the learned District Judge was of opinion that Section 185 of the Madras Estates Land Act permitted only a specific kind of evidence to be adduced in proof of the allegation whether certain land was the private land of the landholder. Taking that view of the section, he came to the conclusion that the plaintiff failed to adduce any proof that the land was his private land. The learned Pleader for the appellant points out that there were at least two documents, Exhibits A and B, which contained an admission of the plaintiff's title. The statement which is said to amount to an admission is to the effect that the land belongs to the plaintiff's patta. He also points out that there was evidence of the plaintiff that the land was hi...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : 43Ind.Cas.508
Krishan, J.1. The facts necessary for the disposal of the second appeal may be briefly staled as follows: One Pedda Ramanna and plaintiff's witnesses Nos. 7, 8 and 9 were partners of a firm. Plaintiff and one Ramayya were jointly interested in all the business carried on by P. Ramanna and they were thus interested also in the partnership share of Ramanna in this firm, though Ramanna alone was the partner. Their position was that of sub-partners with Ramanna in his partnership share, Ramanna representing the whole share in the firm. The defendant is a registered Company, having been so registered in June 1909, but the Company was started originally as an unregistered one. The firm and the unregistered Company had dealings with each other. On account of a dispute as to the amount due on these dealings, there was a reference to arbitration: but the written reference was signed by only two of the partners of the firm, plaintiff's witnesses Nos. 8 and 9, and pot by the other two. There was ...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : (1917)33MLJ684
1. Two points have been raised before us by the appellant in this case: (1) that Exhibit A, the muchilika given by the plaintiff is not valid as it was agreed to only by one of the trustees of the plaint temple and not by the other; (2) that the defendant has a monthly tenancy apart from the lease, Exhibit II and that it has not been properly terminated as the notice to quit given to him was not by his lessors or on their behalf but by the, plaintiff himself and in his own name.2. On the first point, we agree with the District Judge that the muchilika Exhibit A is valid and binding on the temple as it was taken in accordance with the usual practice of the temple by the managing trustee in the name of both the trustees: Though the ordinary rule is that When there are more trustees than one all must join in the execution of the trust and that one trustee can-not delegate any of his duties to his co-trustee, yet the delegation in the regular course of business is not improper, Compare Sec...
Tag this Judgment!Court : Chennai
Reported in : 43Ind.Cas.130; (1917)33MLJ746
1. The plaintiff in this Second Appeal failed to prove that the items of immoveable property which he seeks to recover had fallen to the share of the 5th defendant's husband on partition. When the case came before the Court on the last occasion, as it had been decided by the Lower Courts before the Full Bench decision in Soundararajan v. Arunachalam Chetty I.L.R. (1915) Mad. 159 we thought that it was desirable to ascertain whether although there had not been a division by metes and bounds, there had been a division in status haying regard to the decision of the Privy Council in Suraj Narain v. Ikbal Narain (1912) L.R. 40 IndAp 40 which was acted on by the Full Bench in Soundararajan v. Arunachalam Chetty I.L.R. (1915) Mad.159. The finding in this case is that in a sale-deed concerning immoveable property not in suit, the major co-parcener inserted a recital that he had become divided in an alleged partition many years previously which is found not to have been proved.2. The question a...
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