SHAIKH FAQIR BAKHSH Vs. MURLI DHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiff in this suit, Shaikh Faqir Bakhsh, and the defendant Murli Dhar, are joint proprietors pro indiviso of a property in the City of Lucknow known as Rahimganj, on which a large block of shops has been erected. The entire property was formerly owned by one Khuda Baksh, but it is now held in the proportions roughly of one-eighth and seven-eighths by the par-ties mentioned, who acquired their respective shares in it by purchase. When the plaintiff bought his one-eighth share on 1 April 1921, the defendant Murli Dhar had already acquired his seven-eighths share. At the time when the latter purchased his share of the entire property, a portion of it, consisting of three shops, was in the occupation of the plaintiff as tenant under a lease at a monthly rent of Rs. 14-8-0 and this lease was current when the plaintiff himself purchased the remaining one-eighth share of the entire property.

(2.) In the present proceedings the plain-tiff, now the appellant, asks that an account be taken of the income of the entire property for the period from 1 October 1922, to the e February, 1925 (or 1926-the date is variously stated) in order that his share thereof may be ascertained and paid to him. He claims that in the account the revenue from the portion of the property in his own occupation, being the subject comprised in his lease, should be entered at the monthly rent of Rs. 14-8-0 payable under the lease. The defendant Murli Dhar contends that the plaintiff, having become a pro indiviso proprietor of one-eighth of the entire property and suing as a cosharer for an account of the revenue of the entire property, is not entitled to found upon the lease in question and must bring into the account as the return on the subjects comprised in the lease and occupied by him, not the stipulated rent of Rs. 14-8-0 but the reasonable profits of these subjects, which he estimates at not less than Rs. 350 per month. The real issue in the case is raised by these rival contentions.

(3.) The Second Munsif, Lucknow, before whom the matter came in the first instance, found in favour of the plaintiff by a judgment dated 29 November 1926 which on appeal was affirmed by the Sub-Judge, Mohanlalganj on, 29 March 1927. In both Courts the view was taken that the acquisition by the plaintiff of a one-eighth share of the entire property did not operate an extinction of his rights as a tenant of a portion of the property, and that the plaintiff was accordingly entitled to continue to claim the benefit of the lease and to bring into the account as the income of that portion the rent payable under the lease.