- (1.) THE appellant has filed this appeal against the order of the Collector, Tonk dated the 21st May, 1962 under the Rajasthan Escheats Regulations Act, 1956.
(2.) BRIEFLY, the facts are that one Kanwrilal Brahmin of village Lavadar, Tehsil and District Tonk died in the year 1954. It was alleged by Patwari that he died heirless and a report to that effect was made to the Tehsildar who found that two persons Ram Niwas and Ram Kumar had unauthorisedly taken possession of the deceased land and that Ram Niwas claimed the property of the deceased through adoption. The Collector, Tonk enquired into the matter and issued notices inviting claims to the property of the deceased Kanwarilal. Ram Niwas appellant filed an application claiming himself as an adopted son of the deceased Kanwarilal. In order to prove adoption he appeared as a witness and produced four other witnesses namely Bhura, Amra, Lala and Pansuri to support his adoption case. The Collector Tonk came to the conclusion that the fact of adoption was not proved on the basis of the oral evidence led by the claimant appellant and rejected his claim and referred the matter to the District Judge for passing a vesting order over the property of the deceased in favour of the State. Aggrieved by that order the appellant has filed appeal before us. The learned counsel for the appellant's first contention was that the Collector in conducting the escheat enquiry did not follow the mandatory provisions of the Rajasthan Escheat Regulations Act as laid down in sec. 5 sub-sec. 6 and failed in his duty to make a searching enquiry and to obtain full information from the public records respecting any property to which the Escheat Act applied and in doing so he should not have infringed any private rights or cause unnecessary trouble to individuals. In support he cited RRD 1957 page 119, RRD 1961 page 163. The second contention of the counsel for the appellant was that his client claimed the property of the deceased Kanwarilal as his adopted son and by his oral evidence he has established that Kanwarilal adopted him before he died. A number of witnesses duly corroborated the appellant's plea of adoption. The Government Advocate appearing on behalf of the State pointed out that the proper enquiry was conducted by the Collector, Tonk and proclamations were properly issued inviting objections to the property of the deceased who is reported to have died heirless. The appellant has failed to prove his adoption by his own witnesses. The Collector has properly passed vesting order and the appellant will have an opportunity to contest his case again before the District Judge who has to pass final vesting order over the property of the deceased. We have considered the arguments advanced by both sides and perused the record It is an admitted fact that Kanwarilal deceased died without any natural heir. The appellant has only claimed the property of the deceased as an adopted son and he has tried to prove his adoption on the basis of oral testimony of some of the witnesses who were rightly disbelieved by the Collector, Tonk. The appellant himself as alleged by him was 10 years old when his adoption took place and he cannot be a proper witness to the fact of adoption because of his tender age. Bhoora brother of the present appellant's deposition to adoption cannot be accepted to corroborate the story of the appellant Ram Niwas because he is an interested witness being a brother of the appellant. Similarly Mst. Pansuri the mother of the appellant is also an interested witness and her testimony could be rightly rejected. Lala witness has also reported the appellant's case, but he is not an eye witness to the fact of adoption. On the contrary his father Bhoora in a statement made before the Tehsildar has deposed that no adoption, in fact took place. This only leaves one witness Amra, whose testimony cannot properly be relied upon in support of the fact of adoption. No documentary evidence of any kind has been proved or other facts established to show that Kanwarilal treated Ram Niwas appellant as his adopted son during his life time. Thus a feable attempt has been made by the appellant to prove his adoption and the Collector Tonk has rightly disbelieved the story of adoption. We concur in the finding that no adoption has been proved. The contention that the Collector, Tonk did not make a searching enquiry as laid down in the Escheat Regulation Act is also untenable. It has not been stated by the learned counsel for the appellant as to what informal ion was not collected by the Collector relating to the property of the deceased based on public record. If the Collector failed to lay his hand on some public documents, it was open to the appellant to have produced the document in the Collector's office in support of his own case. This clearly shows that no public record was to be examined with regard to the property of the deceased. The only question before the Collector was whether the deceased left any heir and so far no person has claimed the property as a natural heir of the deceased. The appellant alone has claimed his property as an adopted son of the deceased and he has miserably failed to prove this fact of adoption. The other contention of the learned counsel for the appellant was that since an important and complicated question of law relating to title or status of the appellant to the property of the deceased was involved the Collector should have referred this matter to the civil court of competent jurisdiction under Sec. 7 of the Escheat. Regulations Act instead of deciding it himself. This contention of the counsel is also baseless for the simple reason that only a fact of adoption by the appellant was pleaded and it cannot be said that it was a complicated question of law relating to the status of the appellant. Besides Sub-sec. (7) of sec. 6 of the Escheat Regulations Act only gives the discretion to the Collector to refer the matter to the civil court, if there are two or more claimants in respect of the same property but in this case the appellant was the sole claimant on the basis of adoption and the Collector has rightly, as stated above, disbelieved the appellant's evidence on the fact of adoption. Thus there is no force in the contention of the appellant and his appeal is accordingly rejected. . ;