BAI CHANCHAL GUARDIAN OF MINOR RAMESHCHANDRA PRANSHANKER Vs. MANISHANKER MADHAVRAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) One Madhavram who died on 5th April 1918 had two sons-Pranshanker and Manishanker. Pranshanker died on 20th August 1923 leaving behind him his widow Bai Chanchal. His brother Manishanker survived him. On 14th October 1958 the said Bai Chanchal took the plaintiff in adoption. After his adoption the plaintiff who was then minor filed through his adoptive mother Bai Chanchal the present suit for partition of joint family properties claiming half share therein and also for taking accounts of the collections made by Manishanker on account of Yajaman Vritti. He also made a claim for Rs. 215-50 being half the amount of compensation of a certain land in respect of which an award was made for Rs. 431.00.

(2.) The joint family properties in respect of which the plaintiff filed the present suit principally consist of agricultural lands and houses more particularly mentioned in Schedules A and B to the plaint. The present suit was filed on 15th February 1959. The plaintiff was taken in adoption by Bai Chanchal after the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act 1956 came into force. To the suit Manishanker Madhavram the brother of the said Pranshanker was joined as the defendant No. 1. Manishanker's wife Bai Shiv Ganga alias Chanchal was also joined as the defendant No. 2 to the suit. The original defendant No. 2 Bai Shiv Ganga died during the pendency of the suit and her daughters were brought on record as her heirs and legal representatives. During the pendency of the present First Appeal the original defendant No. 1 Manishanker also died and an application was made to describe the three heirs of the original defendant No. 2 Bai Shiv Ganga also as the heirs of the said Manishanker. That application was granted.

(3.) The defendants Nos. 1 and 2 resisted the suit on several grounds. One of them was that upon the death of Pranshanker in 1923 the joint family properties had vested in Manishanker and that therefore by virtue of the proviso (c) to sec. 12 of the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act 1956 it was not open to the plaintiff to divest Manishanker of those properties and to claim a share therein. The second ground on which the suit was resisted principally by the defendant No. 2 was that some of the immoveable properties mentioned in Schedule A to the plaint were properties which she had acquired in her own right under the will of her mothers sister Bai Diwali.