MOTHER INDIA REFRIGERATION INDUSTRIES PVT LTD Vs. SHARDA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) M. C. Agarwal, J. By this petition the revisionist challenges an order dt. 31-5-84, passed by the 2nd Additional District Judge, Farrukhabad in Suit No. 149 of 1972 where by he allowed the respondents Smt. Shakuntala Devi and Smt. Prabha Pachauri to be brought on record as legal representatives of deceased-plaintiff Smt. Sharda Devi.

(2.) I have heard the learned counsel for the revisionist. No one appeared on behalf of the respondents.

(3.) THE word "legal representative" has been defined in S. 2 (11) of the CPC to mean "a person who in law represents the estate of a deceased person, and includes any person who intermeddles with the estate of the deceased. " Sub-rule (2) of R. 3 of O. XXII provides that where within the time limited by law no application is made under sub-rule (1), the suit shall abate so far as the deceased plaintiff is concerned, and, on the application of the defendant, the Court may award to him the costs which he may have incurred in defending the suit, to be recovered from the estate of the deceased plaintiff. " Thus, the person who is to be brought in as a legal representative is one who in law represents estate of the deceased or intermeddles with it. THE word estate "has a wider scope than the property in dispute. THE law does not say that the per son on whom the property in dispute devol ves would be treated to be the legal repre sentative of a deceased plaintiff. It is not in dispute that in accordance with the Hindu Succession Act the two respondents were the legal heirs of the deceased. It is not the case of the revisionist that the deceased Sharda Devi left no assets to which the Hindu Succession Act applied. THE entire property and rights of a deceased person constitute his estate and the respondents being the legal heirs in terms of Hindu Suc cession Act could represent the estate of the deceased and be brought on record as her legal representatives. THE suit was for pos session of a portion of plot number 3626/1 on which the defendant revisionist was al leged to have trespossed. It was not disputed that the deceased plaintiff was and after her death the respondents were in possession of the rest of the said plot. THErefore, they were the persons who intermeddled with the estate of the deceased and for that reason also they could be brought on record as legal representatives of the deceased.