MARA Vs. NIKKO ALIAS PUNJAB KAUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a defendants appeal by special leave against the order of the High Court of Punjab dated October 20, 1959 dismissing summarily second appeal filed by the appellants. The suit was filed by the respondents for possession of a plot, a house and a Taur and half share in certain lands as preferential heirs of one Pohla after the death of Pohla's widow Punjab Kaur on February 7, 1952. The plaintiffs are Mst. Nikko, sister of Pohla and Jarnail Singh, son of Mst. Har Kaur who was another sister of Pohla. The first appellant Mara is collateral of 4th degree of Pohla and the other two appellants are Mara's sons. The following genealogy gives the relationship of the parties:-

(2.) The parties are Jhalli Jats of village Chomon, Tehsil and District Ludhiana. The plaintiffs claimed that the property was non-ancestral and according to the Riwaj applicable to the family, sisters excluded collaterals in respect of both ancestral and non-ancestral properties. It appears that after the death of Punjab Kaur, Mara got one of the fields mutated in his own name and thereafter took possession of the whole property. He made gifts to his sons of some of the properties and that is why they were joined in the suit. Mara and his elder son Mohinder Singh filed a joint written statement in which they raised many pleas the details whereof need not be given here. They claimed that according to the custom applicable to the family, sister and sister's sons were excluded from inheritance in respect of properties whether ancestral or non-ancestral. They, however, claimed that the property was ancestral and denied the genealogy.

(3.) The Subordinate Judge, Second Class Ludhiana framed six issues of which issues Nos. 2, 3 and 4 alone are important in this appeal. Those issues are:-