UMRAO JAN AND ANOTHER AND JAGGU Vs. GHASITI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE suits relate to the inheritance of a woman named Bando Jan who died in August 1879, leaving a substantial property. Her father Ali Bakhsh and his children professed the Mahomedan religion. She had no issue and she survived her parents. Her heirs according to Mahomedan law were her two brothers, Jaggu and Sannu, who are respondents in the second appeal, and her four sisters, Amir Jan (now represented by Umrao Jan) and Ilahi Jan, who are respondents in the first appeal, Nanhu Jan who is one of the appellants in both appeals, and Banno Jan; and as between them the inheritance would be divided into eight shares, each brother taking two shares and each sister one.

(2.) BANNO brought a suit and obtained a decree in February 1880 for a one-eighth share; and she is no party to the present litigation.

(3.) AFTER a while the brothers reconsidered their position. They determined to assert a claim under the common law of Mahomedans, by which they would take larger shares than under the custom of Kanchans. Thus their interests became adverse to those of their sisters, and they could no longer be co-plaintiffs. They procured orders under which they were made defendants instead of plaintiffs. And they instituted a suit of their own, to enforce their claim against their three sisters. This is the second suit in which an appeal is brought. These matters of procedure have no importance except for the reason that the institution of the brothers' suit is objected to as irregular. The Chief Court have held it to be regular, and their Lordships have declined to hear the appeal on this point argued. The decree complained of can be made as properly in the suit where the brothers are defendants as in that where they are plaintiffs, and the objection is based on a technicality without any practical bearing.