SHAMCHAND PAL Vs. PROTAP CHUNDER PAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE question at issue on this appeal arises in a partition suit in which the respondent was plaintiff and the appellant, who is the respondent's full brother and an older man by about three years, was defendant.

(2.) THE two brothers, who were for some time engaged in a yarn or twist business on their joint account, had, it seems, acquired a considerable amount of property while they were living together as members of an undivided Hindoo family. The plaintiff's case was that part of the joint property, consisting of certain houses in Calcutta, was divided in 1880 under two instruments described as deeds of gift, both dated August 30 in that year, and both duly registered on the following day. He now claimed partition of the rest of the property as specified in a schedule to the plaint.

(3.) THE two deeds, which, of course, must be regarded as parts of the same transaction, were both in the same form. Each referred to the other. By the one the defendant purported to give to the plaintiff out and out a moiety of six houses, stated to be valued in their entirety at Rs.25,250. By the other the plaintiff purported to give to the defendant a moiety of No. 16, Baranasi Ghos's Street, which was stated to be valued in its entirety at Rs.3500. Both the deeds contained a declaration that the parties would continue to own jointly the rest of their joint property, and that if it became necessary to make a further partition the rest of the property should be divided in equal shares, and that neither of the parties should then claim anything or raise any objection on the ground of inequality of valuation in respect of the gifts comprised in the two deeds of August, 1880.