GULKANDI Vs. PRAHLAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a defendants' civil regular first appeal in a suit for declaration and possession.

(2.) THE dispute relates to the estate of one Puranmal. It is common ground between the parties that the said Puranmal died without any male issue of his own, and had three daughters born to him, namely, Msts. Durga, Gulkandi and dhapoo. The first of these died some time in 1950. The other two are appellants defendants before us. Apart from these two, the other two appellants are Ramchander and Badri Prasad, father and son, in whose favour Msts. Durga and gulkandi sold two shops belonging to their father by a registered sale-deed (Ex. PC)dated the 21st February, 1946, for a sum of Rs. 4500.

(3.) THE plaintiff respondent Prahalad's case was that he had been adopted as a son by Puranmal by a registered deed of adoption (Ex. P-A) dated the 23rd Jan. , 1938, and as a result thereof succeeded to the entire estate left by his adoptive father who had admittedly died on the 4th February, 1938. It may also be stated here that Mst. Durga on behalf of herself and as guardian of Prahlad, who was minor at the time, had made a mortgage of one of the shops in favour of one Ramdayal, who is defendant respondent No. 2 in the present appeal, for a sum of Rs. 800 by a registered mortgage-deed Ex. P-B dated the 3rd November, 1941. The plaintiff's case was that his sisters Durga and Gulkandi had no right whatsoever in law to enter into the aforesaid transactions and alienate the family properties which had exclusively vested in him on the death of his father. He, therefore, prayed that the sale-deed dated the 21st February, 1946, and the mortgage-deed dated the 3rd November, 1941, be declared to be inoperative against him, and he further prayed that he be put into possession of the two shops which had been sold out as well as the residential house of which also he had been dispossessed by his sisters unlawfully. This suit was filed by the plaintiff in the court of the Civil Judge, Alwar, on the 24th august, 1946, In forma pauperis. On an objection being raised by the defendants that the suit was under-valued by the plaintiff and that the real valuation of the subject-matter thereof, that is, the properties in dispute, was far more than the pecuniary jurisdiction of the court of the Civil Judge, namely, Rs. 10,000, it was found that the value of the properties in question was Rs. 16,000 and that being so, the Civil Judge returned the plaint to the plaintiff for presentation to the proper court by an order dated the 11th May, 1950. Accordingly the plaintiff re-presented the suit in the court of the District Judge on the 13th May, 1950.