PALA APPANNA Vs. PALA APPA RAO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Plaintiffs in a suit for partition of the property specified in the schedule appended to the plaint (suit property) into two equal shares and for allotment of one such share to them, preferred this appeal against the decree of the trial Court dismissing their suit.

(2.) For the sake of convenience parties would hereinafter be referred to as they are arrayed in the trial Court. Second plaintiff and first defendant died during the pendency of the suit in the trial Court. So, their legal representatives were brought on record.

(3.) The case of the plaintiffs is that in the partition that took place between Thata, their father, and his brother Atchaiah, father of the first defendant, suit property, which was unfit for cultivation, was kept joint but the other properties belonging to the joint family at Thalligaruvu were divided keeping the Well therein joint. Since plaintiffs were not able to advance money for repairs to the said joint Well, first defendant had spent the amount required for repairs and re-construction of the joint Well, after they agreed to the first defendant enjoying the usufruct from the suit property till their share of expenditure of the joint Well is recouped by him from the usufruct therein. Thereafter, Casurina and Cashew trees were planted in the suit property with joint efforts. Even after recouping the amount spent by him for repairs to the joint Well since first defendant prevented them from enjoying their share of the produce in the suit property, they got issued a legal notice seeking partition of the suit property, for which he gave a reply falsely alleging that they sold away the suit property to him. Hence, the suit.