NATHU PIRAJI MARWADI Vs. UMEDMAL GADUMAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The first question raised in this appeal turns upon the manner in which the case was dealt with by the lower appellate Court, and to appreciate the point, it will be necessary to refer to the pleadings and issues.

(2.) The suit was one to obtain possession of certain land, and in the first paragraph of the plaint, the property is claimed by the plaintiff as being his ancestral property. Reference is then made to certain proceedings in a previous litigation before the High Court to which it was said that the defendant had been a party.

(3.) The defendant's written statement contains nine paragraphs which traverse various allegations made in the plaint. But upon a fair reading of this written statement, we do not find that the ownership of the plaintiff is anywhere contested. It is true that there is a reference to the High Court proceedings in the appeal of 1902, but that reference, we think, was merely to rebut an inference which the plaint had suggested that these earlier proceedings were binding upon the defendant, in the matter of the validity of the alienation. This view is supported by the fifth paragraph of the written statement in which the defendant's case is put upon adverse possession, and it is admitted that the lands in suit were formerly in the plaintiffs family.