KOTHANDARAMASAMI NAIDU Vs. PAPPAMMAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) One T.M. Narayanaswami Naidu died in 1889 or thereabouts leaving a will whereby he constituted a certain religious trust called Ramanujamatam and appointed three trustees to manage it. These trustees died and the appellant before us applied for and obtained on 26th September 1894. Letters of Administration with fee will annexed to the estate of Narayanaswami Naidu. From 1894, the appellant was in management of the trust and in 1912 by O.S. 3 of that year, appellant's brother Lakshmiah sued appellant to produce the accounts of the trust and for revocation of the Letters of Administration granted to him. This suit was compromised on 18 December 1912 and a decree passed in pursuance thereof. It provided that plaintiff Lakshmiah should manage the trust properties for 2 years from 1 January 1913 and defendant for the next two years. They shall thus continue to manage the same alternatively in turns of 2 years each.

(2.) Lakshmiah died on 17 March 1917 without apparently recovering possession of the trust properties for his turn 1917 and 1918 from his brother Narayanaswami Naidu. Lakshmiah left a will whereby he bequeathed to his widow and daughters-he had no male issues the right to his turns in the management of the trust properties. The present application of 1922 is to execute the compromise decree of 1912 on behalf of the widow of Lakshmiah who claims to come on to the record as legal representative of her deceased husband. This was allowed by the District Judge and the brother-in-law Kothandaramsami Naidu appeals against this order.

(3.) Several points are raised. First, it is said that the right of management of trust property is not capable of devise or inheritance. It seems to me that prima facie there might be a good deal to be said against both the validity of appellant's original position in 1894 and that of the compromise decree. It is not easy to see how the possession of Letters of Administration to a deceased man's private estate can entitle the holder to become trustee of property which the deceased had alienated in trust. Nor is it obvious, how, assuming that appellant's possession and management as trustee were valid in 1912, he could legally consent to share that possession and management with another. It may be that the compromise decree can be explained as an appointment of the brothers as alternate "trustees by the Court. But however, that may be, this is an application in execution and it is not open to a party to question the validity of the decree which is binding on the parties to the suit till it is set aside, just as much as if it had been passed after contest. Tiruvambala Desikar V/s. Chinna Pandaram 34 Ind. Cas. 57 : 40 M. 177 : at P. 189 : 30 M.L.J. 274 : (1916) 2 M.W.N. 43 : 4 L.W. 306; of., Zemindar of Ettiyapuram V/s. Chidambaram Chetty 58 Ind. Cas. 871 : 43 M. 675 : at P. 687 : (1920) M.W.N. 460 : 28 M.L.T. 75 : 12 L.W. 217 : 39 M.L.J. 203. It must be held then that Lakshmiah was validly in alternate possession and management of the trust properties. In Janakee Debee V/s. Gopal Acharyia 2 C. 365 : 1 Ind. Jur. 737 : 1 Ind. Dec. (N.S.) 523, it was held that the succession to a Shebaitship had not in that case followed the ordinary rules of Hindu Succession and that a Hindu widow oould? not succeed to the offioe as heir of her husband without proof of special custom. This was affirmed by the Privy Council in Janaki DeU V/s. Gopal Aoharyia (4). No special custom has been proved here but the history of this trust so far as it has gone would go to show that ordinary methods of devolution would apply to this office.