Mr. M.R. Jayakar:-

The question in this appeal is whether under the customary law applicable to the members of the Tulla clan resident at mauza Mahmad Tulla in the tahsil and district of Shahpur in the Punjab, collaterals of the tenth degree of a deceased landowner can take precedence over his married daughters in succession to his non-ancestral estate. The question arose as follows: One Sahlion, a Mahomedan landowner of the Tulla clan, resident as stated above, died, leaving him surviving a widow and two married daughters (appellants before the Board) and some immovable property. The widow subsequently gave the property to the daughters by a registered deed of gift dated 8th September 1934. The respondents claiming to be his collaterals instituted a suit against the widow (defendant 1) and the daughters (defendants 2 and 3) asserting that Sahlion's property was ancestral as regards the plaintiffs and that the widow had no right to make the gift which should be declared void and ineffectual as against the plaintiff's rights and invalid after the death or remarriage of the widow. The widow and daughters denied the claim on the ground that the property was not ancestral and that the p