RAJ KUMAR Vs. SMOHAN LAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a defendants appeal arising out of a suit for sale on the basis of a mortgage deed dated 14 October 1920 for Rs. 4,000 executed by Mukat Lal, defendant 1, for self and as guardian of his two minor sons. All these persons are impleaded in the suit, as also other minor sons who were born subsequently. The claim was contested on the ground that the mortgage was without any legal necessity and was not binding on the family. The reply of the plaintiff was that the money had been required for the purposes of an ancestral business and the debt was binding on the family.

(2.) The learned Subordinate Judge has come to the conclusion that it is not true that there was any ancestral family business, but it is proved that the money was required for a family business which had been carried on by Mukat Lal for about 14 years before the loan and that the money was utilized for the purpose of increasing the stock of cloth. He commented on the fact that defendant 1 had not produced the account books of the business, and thought that it was a fact which went a great way against him and in favour of the plaintiff. He came to the conclusion that in view of the fact that Mukat Lal had been and was still running the business of selling cloth for a long time, it was the main source of income for the support of his family. He cited cases which laid stress on a prudent act of a manager being binding on the family, and then held that the debt was borrowed for legal necessity and its payment was binding on the defendants.

(3.) It will be conceded that there was no clear issue as to whether the transaction at the time it was entered into was one which a prudent manager of a joint Hindu family would enter into.