SANTASILA DASI Vs. NARENDRA NATH PAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an application for the grant of probate of the will of one Surendra Nath Pal, who died on 30 April 1927. The will is dated 15 July 1923, and was therefore made more than four years before the death of the testator.

(2.) By that will the testator made certain dispositions of his property and he left the whole of the residue of it to his widow whom he appointed to be the executrix of that will. When the widow applied for probate of the will in the ordinary course a caveat was entered by a brother of the deceased (named Narendra Nath Pal) who filed an affidavit alleging that his brother was at the time he made the will and up to the time of his death a man of weak intellect and had a very imperfect knowledge of English. He also alleged in effect in his affidavit that the will was procured by the undue influence of the widow. But there was a still more serious allegation in the affidavit in that the caveator contended, or at any rate, stated that the will was not genuine, and in effect he said that it was a forgery.

(3.) In the last paragraph of his affidavit he says: I therefore insist upon the said will being proved in solemn form and that I be given the liberty to cross-examine the witnesses produced in support of the will.