MADAMMAL Vs. DEVAYYA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) One Devayya Gowda executed a will, Ex. 1, dated 3 July 1907. He left behind him his widow (Madammal, plaintiff 1) and his daughter-in-law (named Bowrammal, plaintiff 2, in the suit). The plaintiffs suit was for a permanent injunction restraining the defendant from entering on the plaint properties and for other consequential reliefs. The defendant is the husband of Marammal, the daughter of the deceased son of Devayya Gowda and he claims right to possession, under Ex. 1. The question turns on the construction of Ex. 1. The first Court decided the suit in favour of the plaintiffs adopting substantially the construction put upon it by the plaintiffs. But the lower appellate Court dismissed the suit adopting substantially the construction contended for by the defendant. Hence this second appeal by the plaintiffs.

(2.) The document is not very happily worded, and I have to make the very best I can out of the same. But having) carefully considered the terms of the document, I have come to the conclusion that the testator gave the defendant a vested interest in the properties, but the right of possession has been postponed till after the death of the testator's widow and the testator's daughter-in-law (plaintiffs 1 and 2). The testator, after reciting that he had no male heirs, and that he had been maintaining the defendant for the past four or five years, and looking after him as his own son, and after reciting that his granddaughter had been given in marriage to the defendant, proceeded to state as follows.: As I am now 60 years of age, you and ray granddaughter also should maintain me, my wife Madamma and my daughter-in-law Bowramma, during our lifetime and act up to what we order you to do. After our death you yourselves should perform our obsequies etc., and enjoy all the undermentioned properties belonging to us with absolute rights with power to dispose of them by way of gift sala, etc.

(3.) The question is whether under the terms of this document the defendant would be entitled to present possession and management of the same as of right, being only under an obligation to maintain the plaintiffs in a fair and proper manner, or whether the will, on a proper construction, supports the contention of the plaintiffs namely, that after the testator's death, his widow and the daughter-in-law should have each a life-interest in the properties and that, though the defendant was to have a vested interest in the property, the defendant should have possession and enjoyment only after the death of those persons.