RANI JANKI KUNWAR Vs. RAJA AJIT SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Appellant in this appeal is the widow of Raja Bijai Bahadur Singh, one of the talookdars of Oudh, who died on the 17th of June, 1884. The question in the suit relates to the validity of a deed of sale executed by him on the 29th of July, 1872. By that deed he professed, on account of the exigency of payment of debts to bankers and decree holders, and of revenue, to sell to the Respondent Raja Ajit Singh, forty-six villages, with fifty-six hamlets, in consideration of Rs. 1,25,000. Before this transaction took place, proceedings in lunacy under the law for that purpose in India, had been taken against him, which originated in a letter of the Deputy Commissioner of the 7th of January, 1871. An inquiry was made into the state of his mind, which ended in an order being made on the 6th of November, 1871, by which he was found not to be of unsound mind and incapable of managing his affairs, and upon that he was put into the management of his affairs.

(2.) NOW it is important to observe that this was riot long before the making of the deed of sale, being in November, 1871, and the deed of sale being dated on the 29th of July, 1872. So that, although he was, and has been found in some subsequent suits to be, a man of weak intellect, he was at that time considered by the proper authorities, who had made inquiries, to be capable of managing his affairs, and therefore he must be taken to have been capable of entering into contracts, and of knowing the nature of the contracts which he entered into. In 1878 he executed a deed of mortgage to the Respondent Ajit Singh, and in 1879 he also executed a deed of sale to the same person. In 1880 two suits were brought, one by Ajit Singh against Bijai and the, Appellant to recover the principal and interest due upon the mortgage, and the other by Bijai and the Appellants to set aside the deed of sale on the ground of fraud, undue influence, and want of consideration. It should be mentioned that shortly before those suits were brought Bijai had made a deed of gift, dated the 1st of November, 1879, to his wife, the present Appellant, and it is a matter of remark that she relies upon that deed, and has relied upon it all through the proceedings, at the same time setting up that her husband was a man incapable of entering into the other transaction, and of executing the deed of sale of the 29th of July, 1872. These suits went through a considerable course of litigation, and were finally determined in favour of Bijai and the Appellant on the 24th of June, 1884, by the judgment of this Committee.

(3.) THE present suit was brought on the 16th of February, 1884, by Rani Janki Kimwar and Bijai, who had not then died, against Ajit Singh, and the plaint stated that the Defendant Ajit Singh knew that Bijai was a person afflicted with mental and bodily infirmities, and had procured him to execute the deed of the 29th of July, 1872, at a considerably low price, namely, Rs. 1,25,000, and sought to have that deed set aside on the ground of his being incompetent to execute it, and that it had been obtained by fraud. The plaint also contains this allegation, which is important: "That Plaintiff No. 1" - that is the wife - "then" - that is after the decision of the District Judge, dated the 31st of May, 1881, and that of the Judicial Commissioner, dated the 17th of January, 1882 - "commenced to inquire about other matters relating to her husband's property, and on the 25th of August, 1882, she came to know of the real facts of fraud, flattery, undue influence, and other matters relating to the deed of sale of the 29th of July, 1872" - the object of that statement being evidently to shew that the suit was not barred by the law of limitation.