TADIMALLA SUBBA RAO Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The above petition has been filed for the grant of letters of administration with copies of the authenticated copies of the will and two codicils annexed thereto in respect of the estate of a certain John Hunter Alexander, hereinafter referred to as the testator'. The petitioner is Sri Tadimalla Subba Rao, who happens to be the holder of a Power of Attorney of the Executors and Trustees, entitled to administer the estate, who are not residing in India. After the petition was received by the Court it was duly advertised in a local daily. No objections have been received from any body for the issue of letters of administration as prayed for.

(2.) Briefly stated the facts of the case are these: The testator was ordinarily residing at Chickamagalur in the State of Mysore. He was a planter by profession owning properties in India and Scotland. While he was in Scotland, the testator made a will on November 16, 1955, and signed the same in the presence of two witnesses, namely, Mr. David Smith and Miss Laura Cecilia Young, who duly attested it. By that will he appointed James Miller and Robert Fair-weather Alexander as the Trustees to act as executors of the will empowering them or the survivor of them or the heir of the last survivor of them to administer the estate as per directions contained in the will. Later at Bangalore on November 1, 1961, he executed a codicil tc the aforesaid will and another codicil at Kirriemuir, Scotland on May 6, 1964. The testator died at Chickamagalur on June 2, 1970.

(3.) James Miller one of the executors having predeceased the testator, Robert Fairweather Alexander, the surviving Trustee and executor under the will assumed the office of the executor and appointed Mrs. Euphemila Margaret Miller and David Smith to act along with him as the Trustees and Executors of the will and codicils of the testator in exercise of the powers conferred on him by the said documents by executing a deed dt. July 16, 1970 at Kirriemuir, Scotland. Thereafter the will and the two codicils were duly proved along with the document of July 16, 1970 by which Mrs.Millar and Smith were appointed as Co-trustees and Co-executors before the Commissariot of Edinburgh, Scotland and the confirmation (probate) of the will and the codicils was granted on October 2, 1970. The certified extract of the confirmation and the certified copies of the will and the codicils and the deed appointing co-trustees and co-exe-cutors are produced before this Court. Pursuant to the said grant, an Inventory of the Heritable Estate of the value of 83,379 in England and Scotland which belonged to the testator was filed before the Commissariat of Edinburgh which committed the same to the possession of the Trustees and. the Executors by the certificate dt. October 6, 1970 issued by the Depute Commissary Clerk. The certified extract of the said Inventory is also produced before the Court. Because the Trustees and Executors who were all residents of Scotland did not find it convenient to go to India for the purpose of obtaining the necessary letters of administration and to administer the properties of the testator which were in India, they appointed Sri T. Subba Rao, the petitioner herein and Sri M. K. Viswanath, an Advocate of Bangalore Bar to act as their lawful Attorneys jointly and severally in connection with the obtaining of the letters of administration and the administration of the properties belonging to the estate of the testator which were in India by a Power of Attorney dt. October 1, 1970 executed before J. K. Shepherd, a Notary Public at Kirriemuir, Scotland.