The main legal point established in the judgment is the court's discretion to refuse a writ of certiorari based on the failure to raise objection to the jurisdiction of the inferior court and the petitioner's prior submission to the jurisdiction of the Government.

1. The petitioner is a junior member, and the second respondent is the senior most male member of Chirakkal family which migrated from Malabar to the former Travancore State. The matter in dispute between them, relates to their rival claims to an annual grant of about 3900 and odd rupees, and the ultimate question is, whether this is a grant solely to the senior member of the family for the time being, or to the family as a whole in which each member is entitled to a per capita share. The second respondent petitioned the Government of Kerala on the 4th February, 1957, for registering him as the holder of the grant, or Malikhana as it is called. On the 20th March, 1957, some of the junior members of the family including the petitioner, objected to such registry, and claimed that a per capita division of the Malikhana may be made amongst the members of the family. On the 30th April, 1958, Government passed an order, Ext. R1, registering the second respondent as the Malikhana holder. Some of the junior members of the family, but not the petitioner, moved Government for a reconsideration of the above order and as a result, the operation of that order was stayed. Afterwards on the 5th November, 1958, Government vacated the stay order and pursuant to Ext. R1, directed payment to be made to the second respondent by order, Ext. P2, which is now sought to be quashed in these proceedings.

2. The question was agitated before me as to the nature of the grant. The learned counsel for the petitioner contended, that Malikhana grant is a grant to the family and is not a grant to the senior member of the family as pertaining to his "sthanam" and relied on the observations of Sundara Aiyar in his text-book on Malabar Law, Chapter XIX, page 250, that a grant was made to Chirakkal family. He also relied on the definition of the term "Malikhana" in Logan's Malabar Law, Volume II, Appendix XIII, page cciv. Aitchison Treaties, Volume X, pages 14 and 111, contained references to grants to Chiefs and Rulers in Malabar and extracts of an agreement entered into by Chirakkal family with. The East India Company. It is not possible to decide this issue on the materials before me and a writ cannot be issued treating the grant in question, as one which enures to the family as a whole. It is for the petitioner to establish her right by a fresh suit properly framed for the purpose.

3. It was then contended by the learned counsel, that the authority vested with jurisdiction under the Pension Act, 1871, for registering the right relating to "Pensions and Grants of money on land revenue", Malikhana being such a grant, is the District Collector, or the Deputy Commissioner, or any other officer duly authorised, and that therefore Government had no jurisdiction to pass Ext. R1 or P2 order, and on that ground Ext. P2 is liable to be quashed. To this, objection was taken on behalf of the respondents, that the petitioner having submitted to the jurisdiction of Government, cannot now invoke Art.226 of the Constitution. It seems quite clear, by reason of the petition presented to Government on the 20th March, 1957, not only by way of opposing the claim of the second respondent to registry as Malikhana-holder, but also claiming the per capita shares in the grant for herself and other members of the family, that the petitioner had submitted to the jurisdiction of Government, and had even invoked such jurisdiction in her favour. In Pannalal Binrai v. Union of India, A.I.R. 1957 S.C. 397 at 412, the petitioner, who objected before the Supreme Court to the transfer of income-tax cases under S.5 (7A) of the Income-tax Act, 1.922 but had earlier submitted to the jurisdiction of the Income-tax Officer to whom other cases had been previously transferred, was held "disentitled to any relief at the hands of the court" under Art.32 of the Constitution. The principle was examined by Chagla, C.J. in Gandhinagar Motor Transport Society v. State of Bombay, A.I.R. 1954 Bombay 2