Deoki Nandan, J. - (1.) This is a defendants Second appeal in a suit for recovery of maintenance. The plaintiff-respondents Nos. 1 and 2 are, according to the findings recorded by the lower appellate court, the illegitimate daughters of Natthu Lal who is the third respondent in the appeal in this Court and was the first defendant in the suit. The two appellants were defendants Nos. 2 and 3. The first appellant Maya Dev is the eldest daughter of Nattu Lal and the second appellant Moti Lal is her husband. According to the findings recorded by the two courts below, Maya Devi was born of Smt. Chameli Devi who was indisputably the wife of Natthu Lal and had, according to the finding recorded by the lower appellate court, died on the 21st January 1952.
(2.) Natthu Lal admitted the claim of the plaintiff for maintenance. As lung as Natthu Lal is alive, the claim for maintenance is directed primarily and personally against him, and, if need be, against his property. The appellants came into picture because of a gift of property made by Natthu Lal in favour of the first appellant Maya Devi. The learned counsel for the appellants is not concerned about the amount of maintenance and in so far as the decree for maintenance is directed against Natthu Lal. He is concerned only about the charge that has been created for payment of the amount of maintenance so decreed on the property which was gifted by Natthu Lal to the first appellant udder a gift-deed dated the 21st August, 1974. Now a charge for payment of maintenance can surely be created by the decree of court, but the court does not create a charge for maintenance as a matter of course or without considering the facts and circumstances of the case and unless there are sufficient grounds for doing so.
(3.) According to the learned counsel for the appellants, while a Hindu father is personally liable to maintain his legitimate or illegitimate child so long as the child is a minor, Wider Section 20 of the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act 1956, the property or the estate of a person is liable for the maintenance of his or her dependents as defined by Section 21 of the Act, and the liability of the heirs of that person for payment of maintenance of the dependants of the deceased out of the estate inherited by them not regulated by section 22 of the Act. In a case where a dependant has a right to receive maintenance out of an estate that is to say in a case where the right to maintenance is enforced against the estate of a deceased in the hands of his or her heirs under Section 22, if such estate or any part thereof is transferred, the right to receive maintenance may be enforced, according to Section 28 of the Act, "against the transferee if the transferee has notice of the right, or if the transfer is gratuitious, but not against the transferee for consideration and without notice of the right. "Natthu Lal is still alive and the appellants or, at any rate both of them cannot still be said to be his heirs or to have received any property by succession from Natthu Lai. The property received by them by the gift dated the 21st August 1974 is no longer the property of Natthu Lal, so long as the gift stands and is valid. The liability to maintain the plaintiffs is that of Natthu Lal and Natthu Lal alone. The appellants are, by no stretch, liable to maintain the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs' right to maintain can thus be enforced only against Natthu Lal and the property possessed by him. No charge could be created against any perperty which does not belong to Natthu Lal.;