RAJARAM RAJARAM Vs. KHANDU BALU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In August 1909, Malubai, an old woman belonging to the Telagu community of Bombay, presented a petition to be allowed to sue in forma pauperis. After investigation, the Prothonotary, on the 28th of September 1909, granted leave to sue as pauper and her petition then became her plaint in this suit. Malubai used to be a Muccadum of a gang of working women and was, previous to May 1908, possessed of a small house at Kamatipura worth about two or three thousand rupees. She apparently had no nearer relatives than the four sons of her three predeceased brothers. On the 8th of May 1908, she executed a deed of gift whereby she unconditionally transferred and made over her house as a free gift to one of her four nephews named Khandu Balu. She filed this suit for the purpose of having that deed of gift cancelled and the title-deeds of her property returned to her.

(2.) In her petition she stated that she had intended to leave her property to her four nephews after her death, that Khandu at first "taking advantage of her old age and ignorance " represented to her that she should execute some document by which her aforesaid intention would be carried out, and that he said " he would arrange for such a document being prepared." She adds that Khandu, taking advantage of the absence of her other nephew Rajaram, proposed to her that she should leave the said property after her death to him alone and she adds that, though she was unwilling to do so, Khandu finally prevailed upon her to give her consent to that arrangement. She then goes on to say that on the 8th of May 1908 she was taken to the office of a solicitor in Fort, where she was asked to put her mark to a document which was represented to her as the document giving effect to the aforesaid arrangement. On the same day, she says, she admitted execution of the document before the Registrar, but subsequently discovered that the said document was a gift in favour of the defendant and, under the circumstances narrated in her petition, she claimed that she was entitled to have the deed of gift cancelled and her property restored to her.

(3.) It seems that, after executing the deed of gift on the 15th of June 1908, Malubai made a will of which she appointed Rao Saheb Manaji Rajuji Kalewar and another, executors. Before her suit came on for hearing, she died on the 25th of December 1909. Rao Saheb Manaji proved her will and applied to the Prothonotary to have his name substituted as plaintiff in place of the deceased Malubai and to be allowed to continue the suit in forma pauperis, and by an order, dated the 17th of June 1910, made by the then Prothonotary, Rao Saheb Manaji Rajuji became the plaintiff in this pauper suit.