MADHAVRAO RASTE Vs. IMAM BAPU SHERKAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These appeals arise out of three suits, Nos. 101, 102 and 103 of 1920. They were tried together, and the appeals from the decision therein were also dealt with together in the lower appellate Court. Here also the three appeals can conveniently be disposed of in one judgment.

(2.) The plaintiff in each of these suits is Sirdar Raste, a Saranjamdar residing at Poona, and he sued to recover possession of the plaint lands, alleging in each case that it was part of his Saranjam property; that Umabai, as guardian of the previous minor Saranjamdar, had let it under a kabuliyat to the defendants ancestor; that this act of hers was beyond her authority and against the rule that a Saranjamdar's estate is only a life estate, which is resumed by Government on the death of the Saranjamdar and granted again to his successor, and that accordingly the plaintiff is not bound by these particular grants or leases.

(3.) The material facts are that in 1862 a young boy named Gangadharrao was adopted by Umabai, the widow of the last Saranjamdar, and so he became the Saranjamdar. On February 26, 1862, Umabai granted the miraspatra, Exhibit 16, to the ancestor of two of the defendants in Suit No. 103, and in 1863 she granted a kabuliyat, Exhibit 31, to the predecessor-in-title of the defendants in Suit No. 101. In 1866 Gangadharrao died a minor. In the same year the Saranjam was attached and managed by Government up to 1873. While it was so under attachment, Umabai granted the kabuliyat, Exhibit 18, to the ancestor of the defendant in Suit No. 102. In 1873 Umabai, with the permission of Government, adopted another boy named Anandrao.