SRIMATI JANOKI DEBI Vs. GOPAL ACHARJIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Appellant in this case brought a suit to recover possession of certain properties which she alleged in the plaint to be partly brahmuttar and partly debuttur, the latter being dedicated to certain deities of the names of Keshub Roy and others, and also for the possession of the deities themselves from the hand of the first Defendant, Sri Gopal Acharjia Goswami. Although the Plaintiff described part of the properties claimed as her own brahmuttur, which had devolved upon her by right of inheritance, it appeared on the hearing before the first Court, and was admitted by both parties, that the whole of the properties claimed belonged to the deities.

(2.) THE Plaintiff's case was that the properties were in the possession of Lukhun Acharjia Goswami as sebait of the idols; that he having no son of his body, took the Plaintiffs husband Bejoy Lukhun Acharjia, in adoption, and died in October or November, 1859; that Bejoy Lukhun being then a minor, his mother took possession of the properties on his behalf, the right of sebaitship having devolved upon him in the same way as any other property of the deceased would have devolved upon him by right of inheritance; that the idols were established by a remote ancestor of her husband, and the right had devolved from one person to another, following the rule which governs the succession of an ordinary heritable property.

(3.) THE defence of Gopal Acharjia was, that the suit was barred by the law of limitation; that the adoption of the Plaintiff's husband was not valid according to Hindu law; that the Plaintiff, being a female, was not competent to perform the duties which ordinarily devolve upon a sebait, and to fill the office; and that, according to the usage of the family, and the rules regulating the appointment of mohunts to the gaddi, he was entitled to succeed to the deb-sheba estate on the death of Bejoy Lukhun, and the Plaintiff had no right whatever; that originally the deb-sheba was founded by an ancestor of the present Rajah of Panchkote, and the title of sebait was not complete unless he was confirmed in his appointment by the Rajah of Panchkote for the time being, and that Rajah Nilmoni Sing Deo, the present Rajah, had made the confirmation in his favour. Rajah Nilmoni Sing Deo was added as a Defendant, and put in a written statement to the same effect as the last allegation.