1. Heard Mr. Kamal Nayan Choubey, learned Senior counsel for the defendant- petitioners and Mr. V. Nath, learned counsel for the plaintiff-opposite parties.

2. In this application the petitioner has assailed the impugned order, whereby and whereunder the prayer of the defendant-petitioners for abatement of the suit under Section 4(c) of the Bihar Consolidation of Holdings and Prevention of Fragmentation Act (hereinafter referred to as the Act) has been rejected on the ground that the relief of declaration that the plaintiffs are the daughter of late Khedaru Choubey and Phoolkuery cannot be gone into by the consolidation authorities and consequently would not lead to abatement of the suit.

3. Counsel for the petitioners has submitted that the suit filed by the plaintiff-opposite parties was out and out a suit for partition in which the question as to whether the plaintifs are the daughter of Khedaru Choubey or not was a merely an incidental issue. He would, therefore, submit that when the main relief in the suit was for partition, the view taken by the court below of rejecting the prayer of the defendant-petitioner for abatement would be in the teeth of the statutory requir