SMT ASHARFI KUER Vs. SMTRAM PEAREY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These are two connected appeals by the defendant in a suit for accounts and may appropriately be disposed of in one judgment. The relief claimed by the plaintiff is in the following terms: The defendant may be ordered to render to the plaintiff a detailed account of the entire income which may have accrued from the field and residential property, money-lending business and other sources, since the death of Chaudhari Ram Prasad, within a time to be fixed by the Court and of the amount which has been realized, as well as that which is in arrears in respect of the money-lending business under the documents which existed at the time of the death of Chaudhri Ram Prasad or the documents which were obtained after his death in lieu of previous documents or with the income of the property. If she fails to do so, proper proceedings may be taken and Rs. 4200 or such amount as may be found due to the plaintiff by the defendant, under the account, together with interest for past years and interest pendente lite and future up to the date of realization, may be awarded to the plaintiff against the defendant under a decree duly passed in her favour.

(2.) The parties to this suit are daughters of Chaudhari Ram Prasad who died on 17 September 1920. Chaudhari Ram Prasad executed a will on 6 April 1918. By that will he made certain special bequests and left the residue of his estate to his daughters. Clause 18 of the will is as follows: As regards the remaining property and the property mentioned in para. 9, the daughters who may be alive after my death shall have life-interest therein. After their death all the daughters sons who may be alive together with Prakash Narain shall be the owners in equal shares. But first the eldest daughter Naraini Devi shall, till her death, be the lambardar. After her death Champi, then Rampi, and after her death Prakash Narain Singh shall be the lambardar. The daughters shall have no right to partition or to transfer the property. In case there arises any dispute, the trustee or the manager of the property shall settle the same. The lambardar and the mutwalli shall carry on the household expenses and manage bhat, choohak etc.

(3.) Narain Devi is the defendant; she has been referred to throughout the proceedings as Asharfi Kuer. It appears that one Bhagwati Sahai was acting as manager of the estate before Chaudhari Ram Prasad's death. He continued to manage the estate after Ram Prasad's death. In 1926 a suit for accounts was brought against Bhagwati Sahai by Mt. Asharfi Kuer and Mt. Champi. The suit was decreed for the sum of Rupees 6000 in favour of the daughters of Chaudhari Ram Prasad. Although Bhagwati Sahai managed at least part of the property after the death of Chaudhari Ram Prasad it appears that the defendant also intermeddled with the estate. In her written statement she avers that under the will the contesting defendant was made lambardar of the property of the executant. Accordingly, the defendant was and is up till now in possession thereof as lambardar.