(1.) THIS is an appeal under clause 10 of the Letters Patent from the decision of Bhutt J (as he then was) in second appeal No. 415 of 1951. By that decision the learned Single Judge upheld the judgment and decree of the lower appellate Court dismissing the appellant's suit for possession of certain properties.
(2.) THE plaintiff's case was that the property in suit was ancestral property in the hands of her father -in -law Kirtu who died on 4th March 1949, that her husband Nathusingh pre -deceased Kirtu; that the defendants were the surviving daughters of Kirtu, and under section 3 (2) of the Hindu Women's Rights to Property Act, 1937, she was entitled to get the entire property. In the alternative, the plaintiff claimed that even if the property was the separate property of Kirtu she was entitled to succeed to it under section 3 (1) of the Act. The plaintiff's suit was dismissed by the first appellate Court and the learned Single Judge.
(3.) THE only ground urged before us by learned counsel for the appellant was that the additional evidence which the plaintiff wanted to produce should have been admitted under Order 41, Rule 27 of the Code. There is no substance in this contention. It is now well established by the decisions of the Supreme Court in Arjan Singh vs. Kartar Singh AIR 1951 SC 193 and of the Privy Council in Kes -sowji Issur vs. Great Indian Peninsula Railway Company 34 I. A. 115 and other cases that the legitimate occasion for the application of Order 41, Rule 27 is when on examining the evidence as it stands some lacuna or defect becomes apparent and not where a discovery is made outside the Court of fresh evidence and the application is made to import it. The true test, therefore, is whether the appellate Court is able to pronounce judgment on materials before it without taking into consideration the additional evidence sought to be produced. The admissibility of additional evidence under this rule depends not upon the relevancy or the materiality of the evidence sought to be admitted on upon the fact whether or not the appellant had an opportunity of adducing it at some earlier stage, but upon whether or not the appellate Court requires it to enable it to pronounce judgment. The learned Single Judge did not find any difficulty in pronouncing judgment on the evidence as it stood before him. He was the sole judge of the fact whether he was or was not in a position to pronounce judgment on that evidence, and his judgment on the point cannot be disturbed. In this appeal by holding that he should have admitted the additional evidence in order to enable him to pronounce judgment in the case.