T S KOTHANDARAM NAIDU Vs. SUBBIER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The High Court granted probate to the plaintiff of the will of one Janaki. A caveat has been entered by the defendant who applies for the revocation of the probate. He denies that the will produced is that of Janaki or that she was in a sound disposing state of mind when she made that will. The application has been registered as a suit, the person to whom probate was issued being the plaintiff and the caveator being the defendant.

(2.) The second issue raised in the suit is "Has the defendant no interest to support the caveat," and this is the only issue I have tried.

(3.) Janaki is said to be a Brahmin female who was living as the kept mistress of the plaintiff, a Sudra. The defendant neither in his caveat filed in this Court nor in his petition filed in the District Court of South Arcot has alleged that Janaki, the testatrix, was a degraded woman. On the other hand, he appears to have treated her as an ordinary respectable woman and on that footing claimed to be her heir as her maternal uncle. The plaintiff, on the other hand, in his written statement filed in the District Court of South Arcot gives prominence to the fact that Janaki was living a life of unchastity. At the hearing before me, it suited the parties to take up positions just the very reverse of what they took up previously. The only fact on which both the sides were agreed is, that Janaki was leading an unchaste life; and the defendant on this ground asks that she should be treated.as a degraded woman. He contends that as maternal uncle he is her heir and has thus an interest sufficient to enter a caveat. The plaintiff says in answer that there are nearer relations of Janaki in existence, to wit, her husband's brothers. Whether she be a degraded woman or not, they would be, according to him, preferential heirs who would exclude the maternal uncle. As the defendant does not dispute that if Janaki is treated as an ordinary respectable woman, her husband's brothers would be the nearer heirs, he relies upon the fact that she) was a degraded woman and that, on that account, he, as maternal uncle, has a preferential claim.