Judgement

Appeal from a judgment and decree of the High Court (August 22, 1909) reversing a judgment and decree of the Subordinate Judge of Bhagalpur (August 15, 1908).

The suit was instituted by the appellant against the respondent, the widow of his deceased brother, who died without leaving male issue, claiming certain movable and immovable property. The immovable property claimed had originally been included in babuana and sohag grants made to the parents of the appellant and his brother; the movable properties were alleged to be accretions to the babuana properties. The brothers formed a younger branch of the Durbhanga raj family, which was governed by the Mithila school of Hindu law, corresponding (so far as material) to the Mitakshara, but subject to a kulachar or family custom.

The appellant by his plaint claimed the property first by survivorship, and secondly by the kulachar, under which he alleged that widows were excluded from the inheritance of or succession to babuana and sohag properties. The nature of the case appears fully from the pleadings as set out in their Lordships judgment.

At the trial much evidence, both documentary and oral, was adduced with reference to t