BANWARI LAL Vs. RAM GOPAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant, Banwari Lal, was, as the plaint stood after amendment, plaintiff 1 in the suit. Mt. Imarti, who has been impleaded as a pro forma respondent to this appeal, was plaintiff 2. The lower Appellate Court has set aside the decree of the Subordinate Judge and has remanded the suit "for decision according to law." The appeal is directed against this order of remand.

(2.) One Shyam Sundar Lal was at the time of his death, which occurred in 1926, the sole owner of certain property. Mt. Imarti is his widow. He also left him surviving his mother Mt. Katori. In the ordinary course, on Shyam Sundar Lal's death, Mt. Imarti alone should have got possession of the entire property left by him and her name alone should have been entered in the revenue records against the entire property. It appears however that the mother Mt. Katori, raised some dispute in the course of the mutation proceedings, and ultimately there was an agreement between the two ladies, as the result of which Mt. Imarti's name was entered in respect of a portion of the property and Mt. Katori's name was entered against the remaining property. Mt. Katori died in 1933. The appellant Banwari Lal is the son of Shyam Sundar Lal's sister. The defendant Ram Gopal is a distant collateral of Shyam Sunder Lal. On Mt. Katori's death Ram Gopal obtained mutation of his name in respect of the property which had been entered in Mt. Katori's name and took possession of it. Thereupon this suit was filed. The reliefs claimed, as they now stand, are that (a) it may be declared that plaintiff 1 Banwari Lal, is entitled as the reversioner of Shyam Sundar Lal, to obtain possession of the property in dispute after the death of plaintiff 2; and (b) by ejectment of defendant, Ram Gopal, possession over the property in question be given to plaintiff 2 Mt. Imarti. There was also a claim for mesne profits.

(3.) One of the allegations made by Ram Gopal in his defence was that Mt. Imarti was born deaf and dumb. Although it is not stated in so many words, the object of this allegation evidently was to plead that she was excluded from inheritance. The issues framed by the learned Subordinate Judge raised this point. When the case came on for trial, a witness was produced on behalf of the plaintiffs. A portion of his evidence was recorded, and then the parties came to certain terms which were embodied in the proceedings of the Court. The defendant Ram Gopal stated to the Court that if Mt. Imarti would, in the presence of the Court, talk a little, and if she can hear anything spoken by the Court, or in the presence of the Court can hear things said by some one else and can speak a little, then the claim of plaintiff 2 be decreed.