SETH JAIDIAL Vs. SETH SITA RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this case the Appellant Seth Jaidial, the Plaintiff below, is the nephew by birth and the son by adoption of the cross-Appellant Seth Seetaram, the Defendant below. The suit was instituted for the purpose of ascertaining and enforcing the rights and interests of Jaidial as against Seetaram in certain moveable and immoveable property which has been the subject of a number of family transactions from the year 1864 onwards. The history of the case prior to the year 1864 may be briefly stated.

(2.) SETH Lalljee a landowner of Oudh had two sons, the elder of whom was Mocrli Manohur, and the younger Seetaram. Moorli again had two sons, of whom the elder was Rughobardial, and the younger Jaidial. Seetaram has never had a natural son. Up to and after the annexation of Oudh in the year 1856 the family was undivided, and it possessed ancestral estate which included the talooks of Moizuddeenpur and Chandpur. At the time when the mutiny was suppressed Lalljee was dead, and Moorli was the head of the family. He then took steps to procure a settlement with himself or his two infant sons, and a sunnud to himself, so as to constitute himself the sole owner of the ancestral estate. These proceedings on Moorli's part led to counter proceedings on the part of Seetaram, which came before the revenue officers on several occasions. The dispute was also referred to arbitration, and in the month of May 1863 the arbitrator made an award substantially in favour of Seetaram's contention that the lands in dispute were joint ancestral property.

(3.) ON the 25th September 1864 Moorli was on his death-bed. It would seem that his son Rughobardial had attained majority, and that Jaidial was about eleven years old. On that day the family met together, when four documents were framed which are now to be construed.