CHANDU LAL Vs. KALILUR RAHAMAN (LORD SIMONDS)

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this appeal, which is brought ex parte from a judgment and decree of the High Court of Judicature at Fort William in Bengal affirming a judgment and decree of the Subordinate Judge, Jalpaiguri, it is necessary for their Lordships to deal only with one of the many questions which have in the course of the proceedings been debated in the Courts of India. Upon all other questions it has been properly conceded by learned counsel for the appellants that the judgments under appeal cannot seriously be challenged.

(2.) The single question argued before the Board was as to the validity of the plea raised by the appellants that the claim of the plaintiffs in the present suit to be lawful heirs of one Safiquddin, who died intestate on 11 March 1924, was res judicata in a previous suit, namely Suit no. 1 of 1922 which had been heard and determined by the Subordinate Judge of Jalpai-on 23 August 1924. If that plea was valid, there was no question but that the appeal must succeed: if it was not, then, though the appellants had raised a number of alternative pleas, it was plain to their Lordships that they could not be maintained and the appeal must fail.

(3.) The appellants contended that the judgment in Suit No. 1 of 1922 (which will be referred to as "the previous suit") operated under the principle of res judicata to preclude the plaintiffs from asserting that they were the lawful wife and lawful children of Safiquddin. Upon this question the judgments of the Subordinate Judge and the High Court were alike adverse to the appellants and their Lordships see no reason for coming to a different conclusion.