MATA DIN Vs. SHEIKH AHMAD ALI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this case the appellant has been unsuccessful, first, before the Subordinate Judge at Lucknow, next before the District Judge of Lucknow, and lastly before the Court of the Judicial Commissioner of Oudh. The Court of the Judicial Commissioner granted a certificate for an appeal to their Lordships Board on the ground that the case raised a question of law as to whether the transfer of a Muhammadan minor s property by a person who was not his natural guardian should be upheld, if made to discharge a debt payable by the minor.

(2.) The facts of the case are these :-- Sheikh Ahmad Ali, the respondent, was the grandson of Amir Haider, who, in his lifetime, was possessed of two villages, Kabirpur and Karora. Amir Haider mortgaged a 15 annas share in Kabirpur to the defendant- appellant on the 2nd December 1885, and on the 7th August 1886 he executed another mortgage in favour of the same creditor of a 4 annas share in Karora. The mortgages provided that the mortgagee should take, (and he duly took,) immediate possession of the mortgaged property for the purpose of realising the agreed interests out of the annual profits, making over the surplus, if any, to the mortgagor. The terms of the said mortgages were for ten and seven years respectively.

(3.) Amir Haider died on the 12th August 1887, leaving a will dated the 7th December 1886, by which he bequeathed his entire estate to his four grandsons equally. The plaintiff was about twelve years old when his grandfather died. Afterwards, on the 15th June 1889, the three elder grandsons, on their own behalf, and one of them, Ashraf Husain, purporting to act also as the guardian of the plaintiff, sold the village at Kabirpur to the appellant in consideration of the discharge by him of the debts secured thereon and on Karora, together with certain other smaller sums, making up a total of Rs. 18,500. The effect of this sale, if held good, was that the plaintiff lost his interest altogether in the village of Kabirpur, which was the larger and more important property, while the smaller village Karora was thenceforth free of the mortgage.