LAWS(PVC)-1933-11-153

RAJANI KANTA PAL Vs. SAJANI SUNDARI DASSYA

Decided On November 16, 1933
RAJANI KANTA PAL Appellant
V/S
SAJANI SUNDARI DASSYA Respondents

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a suit in which one Sreemati Sajani Sundari Dassya, widow of, the late Jadu Nath, sues for maintenance and the recovery of certain ornaments, the defendants to the suit being her brother-in-law, Rajani Kanta Pal, and others who are called as representatives of her late father-in-law, Madan Mohan.

(2.) In the first Court the plaintiff was held disentitled to any maintenance, though she recovered, their Lordships understand, the value of the ornaments which She claimed, but the learned Judge indicated that if there was any legal liability for maintenance, the appropriate allowance would be at the rate of 20 rupees per month.

(3.) On the case being taken to the High Court the judgment of the Subordinate Judge was in part recalled and liability was held to be established against the defendants for the maintenance of this lady, and the rate of maintenance was fixed at 80 rupees per month. 3. In the present appeal, counsel on behalf of the defendant, Rajani Kanta Pal, now the appellant, endeavoured to persuade their Lordships that there was no legal ground of liability for maintenance. That contention their Lordships regarded as hopeless. The liability of Madan Mohan towards the widow of his son was, no doubt, on the authorities, a moral liability, but that liability, when transmitted to his sons on his death, became, in their persons, a legal liability, the measure of which, however, was restricted to the amount of the estate to which they succeeded from their father. These principles of law have been established by authoritative judgments and are applicable to a family governed, as was this family, by the Dayabhaga law. The matter is not one which can be reopened before their Lordships.