DALIP SINGH Vs. DHARMAN AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal arises out of a suit for a declaration at the instance of the Plaintiff -Appellant to the effect that the gift made by Defendant No. 1, as detailed in the plaint, in favour of Defendants Nos. 2 and 3 will not be binding on the Plaintiff and that it will not have any effect on his rights as the adopted son off Dharman, defendant No. 1. It has been alleged by the Plaintiff -Appellant in his plaint that he was adopted about four years before the institution of the present suit by Defendant No. 1 and since then had been living with him as his adopted son. It has been further alleged that the parties are Jats and governed by the customary law and the land being ancestral the same cannot be legally alienated by Defendant No. 1 and so the alienation in question is illegal and not binding on the rights of the reversioners. The Defendants resisted the suit. The gift of the land in favour of Defendants Nos. 2 and 3, daughters of Defendant No. 1, was admitted, but the fact that the Plaintiff was the adopted son of Defendant No. 1 or that the property in dispute was ancestral had been controverted. The pleadings of the parties led to the framing of the following issues by the trial Court -

(2.) IT may be stated here that the lower appellate Court held that since the adoption in question had been made after the commencement of the Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act of 1956, hereinafter called the Act, so it shall be deemed to be governed by the provisions of the Act, which make it amply clear that the adoptive father or mother are free to alienate the property held by them either by gift or will.

(3.) FOR the reasons recorded above, this appeal fails and is dismissed. There is, however, no order as to costs.