CHODAGIRI SESHAYYA Vs. ALLURI VENKATARAJU AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) AT some time prior to the year 1893, the exact date is unknown, one Chodagiri Bojjigadu died leaving a widow, Viri, and a daughter. At the time of his death he owned three items of Immovable property. The widow died about the year 1917. Prior to her death she had alienated those items of property and two other items which the Court below held were her stridhanam property. The daughter died in 1943. The plaintiff in the suit is the nephew of Bojjigadu and he claimed from the alienees or their successors all the five items of property on the ground that they formerly belonged to Bojjigadu and that the alienations were not binding upon him.

(2.) THE plaintiff was unsuccessful in respect of all items of property and the present appeal was filed challenging the judgment of the learned Subordinate Judge of Narsapur before whom the suit came on for hearing and by whom it was decided. At the outset Mr. Chandrasekhara Sastri for the plaintiff -appellant informed us that he abandoned the appeal so far as items 1, 2, 4 and 5 were concerned and he proposed only to pursue the appeal in respect of item 3 which formerly belonged to Bojjigadu and which is now in the possession of the fourth defendant in the suit, the fourth respondent in the appeal before us. The sole ground upon which the decision of the lower Court is sought to be set aside is that the alienation was not for legal necessity, as was found by the learned Subordinate Judge.

(3.) IN the Court below evidence was given by three witnesses that the income or revenue from the five items of property was insufficient to maintain the widow and the daughter and, it would follow, that other income would be required in order that they should be able to keep themselves alive. The alienation took place more than 50 years ago. All the parties to the sale as well also, as witnesses and others whose names appear on the document are now dead. Had the deed been questioned during the lifetime of all the parties concerned, in the absence of any recital that the property was being sold for legal necessity, nevertheless evidence aliundi could have been given to show that legal necessity was present and was the reason for the sale. The same position must exist when all the parties are dead.