TANJORE KANNAMMAL Vs. TANJORE RAMATHILAKAMMAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by the 1 defendant against the decree passed by Masilamani Pillai, J., sitting on the original side in a suit brought by the plaintiff for the recovery of house No. 201, Mint Street, for declaring certain mortgages on the house invalid and for properties described in Schedules B, C and D.

(2.) The main contention in the case is as regards the title to the house. The house was purchased in 1897, the sale-deed being in the name of the plaintiff's mother. It may be stated at once that the plaintiff and the 1 defendant are members of the dancing-girl caste and they are a family of dancing-girls. In 1897, when the house was purchased, plaintiff's mother was living with her mother Rukmani Ammal and with the 1 defendant, her sister. The 1st defendant was then a young girl about ten years old. It is the 1 defendant's case that the house, though purchased in the name of plaintiff's mother Jeevarathnammal, was really joint family property of herself, her mother and her sister. The learned Judge who tried the case has decided that the house belonged exclusively to Jeevarathnammal and on her death it passed to her heir, the plaintiff, and he has given a decree for that house to the plaintiff.

(3.) So far as the purchase-money of Rs. 4,300 that went towards the purchase of this house is concerned, there is no very clear evidence as to whom it belonged. It was suggested by the 1 defendant that the money was realized by the sale of jewels belonging to herself, her sister and her mother. But that case has not been accepted by the learned Judge and it seems to me for a very good reason, for the 1 defendant was too young to know how exactly the money was found. In fact, she admits except that she found some of the jewels missing after the purchase of the house, she had no reason for saying that any money was obtained by the sale of the jewels and that the house was purchased with that money. There is also evidence in the case which shows that at the time of the purchase, the mother, Rukmani Ammal was not earning anything by her profession. The 1 defendant was altogether too young to earn anything at the time. So the only earning member at the time of the purchase the plaintiff's mother; Jeevarathnammal There is no very clear evidence that at the time of the purchase her mother had any jewels at all, so that the possibility of jewels having been sold for the purchase of the house has also not been established. We have then a case where three dancing-girls are living together, only one of them earning and purchasing a house in the name of that earning member.