Judgement

Appeal (No. 84 of 1927) from a decree of the Court of the Judicial Commissioner, North-West Frontier Province (August 26, 1925), reversing a decree of the District Judge at Peshawar (June 10, 1924).

The suit was brought in 1923 on behalf of the appellant, a minor, against the three surviving sisters of the appellants mother Nikko, who died in 1911, and other defendants. The plaintiff claimed her deceased mothers share of property which had devolved upon her mother and her mothers sisters upon the deaths of their father Balmokand and his widow. The plaint asserted that the plaintiff was entitled by a deed of compromise dated June 23, 1910, “ and by riwaj (custom)." The parties were Arora Sikhs resident at Peshawar.

The facts of the case, and the pleadings, both in the present suit and in that compromised in 1910, appear from the judgment of the Judicial Committee.

The District Judge decreed the suit, holding that the compromise was a valid family settlement, and that under it the plaintiff was entitled to recover.

The Judicial Commissioner set aside the decree on the ground that in the previous suit the interest of Gurmukh Singh (the husband of Nikko) was adverse to that o