SAJJA RAVINDRA Vs. SAJJA CANGADHARUDU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellants are the plaintiffs in O.S.No.14 of 1979 on the file of the Subordinate Judge, Krishna District at Machilipatnam. They filed the said suit for partition of properties mentioned in Schedules A, B and C by metes and bounds, between themselves and the defendants and to allot 1/6th share by taking good and bad qualities into consideration in all the properties. The said suit was decreed partly to the extent the defendants conceded and dismissed the rest of the claim of the plaintiffs. Hence this appeal.

(2.) During the pendency of the appeal the defendant No.1 died. But a Memo was filed in the Court that the other defendants represent his estate and no other legal heirs need be brought on record. The counsel appearing for the defendants also brought to our notice that the defendant No.1 executed a registered Will in the year 1999 before his death. This fact need not detain us from examining the correctness or otherwise of the Judgment, since the Will is subsequent to the dismissal of the suit and pending appeal the same is subject to the result of the appeal.

(3.) The parties are referred as arrayed in the plaint. The case of the plaintiff was that the defendant No.1 and one Kotanagayya were the sons of one Pedavullakki of Chintaguntapalem. But that the said Pedavullakki having addicted to vices shifted from place to place and ultimately after the death of his wife, he lived with his two sons. With his brother-in-law Jagapathi at Pedana for some time and thereafter his whereasbouts were not known. The defendant No.1 had a brother apart from 4 sons. Sajja Lokeswara Rao, father of the 1st plaintiff and husband of the 2nd plaintiff was his first son. The plaintiffs contended that the properties described in A-schedule and B-schedule were acquired with the nucleus of the joint family find and also from joint exertions of all the members of the family. Even if the properties are held to be self acquired properties. The defendant No.1 blended his properties into the joint family property and made improvements to the property, since the properties in C-schedule were purchased in the name of family members of Defendant No.1 after filing the suit for partition, they are also to be treated as joint family properties. It is also one record that plaintiff No.2 was married to the said Lokeswara Rao on 18-03-1976 and after giving birth to plaintiff No.1. Mr.Lokeswara Rao died on 15-5-1978. During life time of Mr.Lokeswara Rao, while defendant No.1 was doing cloth business in Partnership with one Pichuka Gopalakrishna Murthy, the joint family of the defendant No.1 represented by late Lokeswara Rao along with his grand-father Guthi Kotenjaaneyulu started a separate business in the name and style of Ravindra Textiles. After the death of Mr. Lokeswara Rao, disputes have arisen between the plaintiffs on one hand and the defendants on the other hand and the plaintiffs were forced to leave the house of the defendants within 8 months thereafter. Hence they were forced to file a suit for partition of the family properties.