JUDGMENT

THOMMEN, J.:— Allowing the plaintiffs appeal and setting aside the decrees of the Courts below, the High Court, after finding that the factum of adoption had been established, stated as follows on the question of the validity of the adoption:

"The question then arises is the adoption legal and valid in law in view of the provisions of the Act? Section 10 of the Act inter alia provides that no person shall be capable of being taken in adoption unless the four conditions therein laid down are fulfilled. We are concerned with the fourth condition and it is as under:

(iv) he or she has not completed the age of fifteen years. unless there is a custom or usage applicable to the parties which permits persons who have completed the age of fifteen years being taken in adoption.

At the time when the plaintiff was adopted he was about 22 years old, but even though there is a difference of opinion between various schools as to the age when a boy may be adopted, so far as the Bombay State is concerned the position is well settled in view of more than one judicial decision. As pointed out in Mullas Hindu Law, 14th Edition at page 550 in the Bombay State a person may he adopted at any age t