Judgement

Appeal (No. 28 of 1935) from a decree of the High Court in its appellate jurisdiction (June 5, 1934) reversing a decree of the High Court in its original civil jurisdiction (December 1, 1933),

The appellants, who carried on business as moneylenders, lent money to a father and son, who constituted a joint Hindu family, on the security of property belonging to them. A suit on the mortgages brought by the appellants was settled and a consent decree made. About a year before that decree a preliminary decree for partition was passed by the High Court in a partition suit which had been filed by the son against his father and mother. The preliminary decree in that suit allotted a one-third share of the joint family property to the mother, Dhanabati. No actual division of the property was in fact made.

The appellants alleged (inter alia) that the partition had been made with the object of saving from the mortgages the share allotted to the mother, and they claimed (inter alia) a declaration that the mortgages and the decree in the mortgage suit were binding upon her.

The facts appear from the judgment of the Judicial Committee.

Buckland J. held that at the time of the institution