SANT KAUR Vs. LAKHWINDER SINGH AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The revision petition is against the order passed by the executing court on an objection taken by a person claiming to be a legal representative of the judgment-debtor. The court auction purchaser who had purchased a property belonging to the judgment debtor Satwant Singh claimed the right to property under auction held on 3.4.1997, confirmed on 14.6.1997 and sale certificate issued on 16.7.1997. The sale proceedings had commenced after the death of Satwant Singh after bringing on record the nephews (sister's sons) of the judgment debtor. They claimed interest in the estate through a Will alleged to have been executed by Satwant Singh. When they moved the application to implead claiming on the Will, the decree-holder raised no objection and the representatives had originally taken sometime to make the payment failed in their undertaking and allowed the attachment and sale to take place. Amongst bidders of the auction was the sister of the judgment debtor, who incidentally was another daughter of the petitioner.

(2.) The petition was filed by the mother of the judgment debtor contending that the executing court had allowed for the impleadment be made of the nephews as the legal representatives without proper inquiry of their status as such. According to the mother, her son did not execute any Will and she, as class I heir, was the only person entitled to his estate. The second objection was that the petitioner's interest in the property could not have been allowed to be knocked out in an auction without addressing her right in the manner contemplated under Section 50 of the Civil Procedure Code (for short 'the Code'). According to her, she was the owner of the whole property and right could not have been lost by merely allowing for her grand son to be impleaded, who had no right to the property and the court auction sale cannot operate to extinguish her proprietary right to the property left behind by her deceased son. It was further contention that the property was very valuable and it had been sold for a grossly inadequate consideration of '1.40 lacs and odd. The sale had been vitiated. The invalidity of the sale would start from want of notice to the petitioner as a legal heir and that the entire proceedings of sale and the action of the purchaser of the deliver would require to be stopped and her own right confirmed.

(3.) The petitioner's objections before the executing court were rejected on a factual consideration that the grand sons of the petitioner were approaching the court on the basis of a Will voluntarily, when the petitioner did not take any action to implead herself as a legal representative of the deceased son. It was pointed out that the petitioner had actually allowed for mutation of revenue entries to be made from the deceased' son to themselves where copy of the Will had been referred to and the petitioner had not made any objection for the same. The court found also that the petitioner's own daughter made a vain bid at the time of court auction to purchase and the petitioner, who is residing in the same house as her daughter making bid in the court, ought to have been known about the pendency of the proceedings and if she had allowed the sale to take place, it was too late to seek for any objection at the time of delivery of the property. The court rejected the other contentions regarding alleged impropriety in the procedure and alleged inadequacy of the consideration.