Judgment

GAJENDRAGADKER, J. : This appeal by a certificate given by the Rajasthan High Court arises from a suit filed by the respondent Mst. Manphool Bai against appellant 2 Ladu Ram for the recovery of the arrears of rent and for ejectment. To this suit the respondent joined appellant 1 her mother in-law Gulab Bai as a pro forma defendant. The property in question is a shop situated in the Johri Bazar at Jaipur. This property originally belonged to Chhogalal, and after him it devolved on his adopted son Phool Chand. The case for the respondent is that her husband Lal Chand had been adopted by appellant 1 after the death of her husband Phool Chand. Appellant 2 had executed a rent note (Ex. 24) in favour of Lal Chand in Samvat Year 1939. On Lal Chand s death the respondent held the property as his widow and as such she served a notice on appellant 2 on May 31, 1938, calling upon him to pay the arrears of rent due from him and asking him to vacate the shop (Ex. 16). It appears that soon thereafter on August 27, 1938, appellant 2 executed a rent note in favour of the respondent (Ex. 21) but apparently appellant 2 failed to pay the rent regularly and so on January 17, 1939, the respondent had to sue appellant 2 for arrears of rent due and for ejectment. This suit was filed in the Court of Munsiff, East Jaipur. The amount due by way of arrears which was claimed in that suit was Rs. 700/. Appellant 2 resisted the said claim made by the respondent mainly on the ground that the rent note on which the suit was based had been executed by appellant 2 in favour at the respondent an her mother-in-law and that the suit was defective for want of a necessary party inasmuch as the mother-in-law had not been joined to it. Appellant 2 claimed that the respondent, acting by herself, was not entitled to claim either the arrears or to ask for ejectment. Incidentally be pleaded that the rent in question had been paid by him to the respondent s mother-in-law Gulab Bai. This litigation went up to the Jaipur Chief Court in second appeal. All the Courts upheld the principal plea raised by appellant 2 that Gulab Bai was a necessary party to the suit, and so on the preliminary ground that for non-joinder of the necessary party the suit was defective the claim made by the respondent was rejected. The decision of the Chief Court was pronounced on May 26, 1941. It was under these circumstances that the respondent filed the present suit on November 15, 1943, in the Court of Civil Judge, Sawai Jaipur, claiming to recover Rs. 2,400 /- as arrears from appellant 2 and asking for his ejectment from the suit premises; and as we have already stated the respondent impleaded appellant 1 as a pro forma defendant to this suit.

2. Several pleas were raised by appellant 2 against the claim made by the respondent. In the present appeal, however, we are concerned only with two of these pleas. It was urged by appellant 2 that the present suit was barred by res judicata and so since appellant 1 had not joined the respondent in making the claim the suit was incompetent. It was also urged in the alternative that on the merits it should he held that the rent note had been executed by appellant 2 in favour of two lessors, appellant 1 and the respondent. The trial Court rejected these pleas and passed a decree in favour of the respondent and against both the appellants for Rs. 1,800/-. It also directed appellant 2 to vacate the premises by the end of March, 1948, failing which the respondent was given a right to execute the decree against him. Against this decree both the appellants preferred an appeal in the Court of the District Judge. The learned District Judge held that the respondent s suit was barred by res judicata and so he allowed the appeal and dismissed the respondent s suit. Then the matter reached the Rajasthan High Court at the instance of the respondent in second appeal. The High Court has reversed the conclusion of the District Court on the question of res judicata a