RUKMANI AMMAL Vs. ANGAYARKANNI (MINOR) AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appeal involves an interesting question whether a gift by a Hindu widow would clothe the donees with rights which they could uphold even as against a subsequent alienee from the widow for necessity, the necessity for the subsequent alienation having been ultimately approbated by the reversioner. The matter has not been kept in proper focus by the Courts below, and that is why I have been constrained to simplify the essential situation, by eliminating facts which are peripheral, and do not directly bear upon it. The following facts will be sufficient for an appreciation of the principles of law which have to be applied to the present case. There was a certain Chellathammal, who held the suit property as a restricted owner under the Hindu Law relating to estates taken by women. I have to make it clear that this is the finding of the Courts below, and that, naturally, it forms the basis upon which other facts have to be assessed. For, learned Counsel for first and second defendants (respondents) has urged that the reversioner did concede in certain proceedings that the suit property was the absolute property of Chellathammal, which she could deal with as such; the argument is that had the reversioner brought the present suit, a species of estoppel could have been advanced against him by respondents, the benefit of which they have now been deprived of; because the suit is by the subsequent alienee from Chellathammal, not by the reversioner himself. But this argument need not really further detain us, in the light of the explicit findings of the Courts below, that the property is not the absolute property of Chellathammal, but held by her only in woman's estate. The defendants claim, in virtual substance, under a gift deed from Chellathammal, purporting not merely to create a life interest in one Vadivu for her lifetime, but also to gift over the property absolutely to defendants 1 and 2 (minors) subsequent to the estate taken by Vadivu. In other words, Chellathammal dealt with the property, and purported to do so, only as her absolute property. Since it is equally indisputable that she held it only as a limited owner, the gift deed in favour of the contesting respondents would appear to be ab initio null and void. It was not merely a voidable transaction, which could be considered good until it was avoided by the reversioner in specific suit brought for the purpose.

(2.) The widow (Chellathammal) purported to revoke the very gift or settlement in October 1947, and there was some controversy in the Courts below whether she had a power to do so But, in the light of the clarification that I have made regarding nature of the estate and the wholly void character of the document of gift, the question of revocation need not really be gone into. The sale deed to plaintiff is in February 1954, and, after the death of Chellathammal, the transaction of sale was affirmed by the reversioner in 1958. The Courts below have, in my view unnecessarily, gone into the particulars of the evidence on the aspect whether the sale was for necessity binding upon the reversioner. The reversioner has approbated the transaction, and unambiguously acknowledged the necessity as binding on him. He is not a party to suit, but the document of approbation and release has not been assailed in any manner, and its genuineness is not in dispute. In those circumstances, the simple question is whether an anterior donee under a Hindu widow, under an invalid gift, would have a title which could prevail over a subsequent alienee of the property from the same widow, where the alienation was for necessity binding on the reversioner. In this view it is unnecessary to canvass the further argument advanced by Sri Raghavachari for the contesting respondents (defendants 1 and 2) that a mere release deed does not clothe the person in whose favour it is made with the same kind of rights which could flow from an actual conveyance, and that, in this sense the plaintiff cannot be regarded, as a representative of the rights of the reversioner.

(3.) It is unfortunate that the essence of the situation has been missed by the Courts because it appears to me to be very clear that, on the stated facts, the plaintiff is entitled to the declaration that his title would prevail over any rights derived by defendants 1 and 2 from the invalid gift deed. There was some attempt at an argument that even the gift deed might prevail, unless the reversioner chose to file a suit in vindication of his own rights to the estate, after the lifetime of the widow. But this is not correct, and the following authorities make the matter clear beyond dispute. In Nagireddi v/s. Durairaja Naidu, (1952) S.C.J. (15) 192 the Supreme Court has held that where a transfer by a widow was void, and not for any necessity binding upon the reversioner, the reversioner "may at his pleasure treat it as a nullity without the intervention of any Court." The case is stronger here, because this is an instance of a total gift of the property, treating it as absolute estate, which is ipso facto void and a nullity. Even the consent of the next reversioner could not validate such a gift. This is clear from the Bench decision of the Allahabad High Court in Abdullah v/s. Ramlal 34 All 129. A single Judge of the Bombay High Court also held in Tukaram v/s. Yesu 55 Bom. 46 that a gift by a widow of the estate in favour of a stranger, could not be validated by the consent of the next reversioner as against the eventual reversioners of the adopted son, It seems to me to be therefore indisputable that plaintiff is entitled to the declaration of proprietary interests in the property in his favour, as against any title which could at all be advanced by defendants 1 and 2 on the strength of the revoked gift deed. The second appeal would have to be allowed on this aspect.