Judgment

KOSHAL, J.:- This appeal by special leave is directed against the judgment dated 3rd of April, 1969 of the High Court of Kerala rendered in a Second Appeal arising from a suit for partition of immoveable property.

2. The suit was filed in the Court of Munsiff at Parappanangadi in the veer 1938. That Court passed a preliminary decree for partition in the 18th February, 1940 and thereafter the parties took no further interest in the matter for more than two decades. In the meantime the High Court passed an order dated December 22, 1956 redefining the territorial limits of the Courts of Munsiffs functioning in district Calicut, of which the Court of Munsiff at Parappanangadi was one. According to that order the territory in which the property disputed in the suit was situated came under the territorial jurisdiction of the Munsiffs Court of Manjeri and it was in that Court that the plaintiff filed, on the 18th January, 1966 an application (I. A. No. 109 of 1966) praying that a final decree in the suit be passed. Defendant No. 12 (who is now dead and is represented in this appeal by respondents No. 1 and others) immediately took an objection that the Manjeri Court had no territor