Judgment.-The first defendant in O.S. No. 25 of 1970 in the Court of the Subordinate Judge of Kancheepuram is the appellant. The suit was filed by one Lakshmi Devi as plaintiff impleading the first defendant, her mother and defendants 2 and 3 her brothers. The plaintiff and the defendants 2 and 3 are the issues of one Narayanasami Naidu, who died intestate on 1st November, 1966. He left behind certain properties. According to the plaintiff Narayanasami had owned ancestral properties and he built up a business as a military contractor out of his own self-acquisitions. He is said to have acquired the properties described in schedules A, B and C to the plaint out of the income from that business. The plaintiff, therefore, claimed one-fourth share in the properties.

2. The defendants filed a common written statement in which they contended that the suit properties were not the self-acquired properties of Narayanasami Naidu and that they were the properties of a joint family consisting of Naravanasami and his issues. They denied the plaintiff’s claim for one-fourth share in the suit properties. According to them Narayanasami had only l/3rd share in the properties and the plaintiff would be entitled to one-fourth share in that l/3rd share.

3. When the suit came up for trial the plaintiff and the third defendant entered into a settlement, with the other parties to the litigation signing the compromise, with the result that the plaintiff and the third defendant got one-fourth share each in the properties. This compromise was entered into on 18th January,1972. The consequence is that one half of the properties covered by the suit have already gone to the plaintiff and the third defendant. At that stage the first defendant filed an additional written statement contrary to her earlier stand, contending that the properties left by Narayanasami were the self-acquired properties and that he was entitled to one-fourth share therein. This claim was opposed by the second defendant, his contention being that the properties were only joint family properties.

4. The Court below came to the conclusion that the properties are the joint family properties of Narayanasami and others and that the first defendant is entitled to only l/12th share in all the properties and not one-fourth share as she claimed. It is this decision which is now the subject-matter of the appeal at the instance of the first defendant.

5. On behalf of the appellant, the learned counsel contended that the Court below should have upheld the claim of the first defendant put forward in her additional written statement that the properties acquired by Narayanaswami were only his self-acquisitions and that they did not form part of any joint family property. For the respondents viz., the second defendant, the submission was that the whole properties were built up out of the joint family nucleus and that, at any rate, the first defendant has to prove her claim that these properties were the self acquired properties of Narayanasami.

6. Therefore, the main question that arises in this appeal is whether the properties left by Narayanasami and which formed part of the suit are joint family properties or his self-acquired properties. At this stage there is no dispute about a house bearing No. 129 of Sengaluneerodai Street, Big Kancheepuram, having been obtained by Narayanasami in a partition between himself and his brothers. That house was in the occupation of Narayanasami since that partition in or about 1919. That property yielded only a small income.

7. The first aspect to be examined is whether Narayanasami had started his business from any earnings he had made as an employee in the military department. The claim of the plaintiff, which is now adopted by the first defendant, was that he had brought about Rs.3,000 at the time he was discharged from the Army in or about 1918. There is absolutely no evidence of his having been employed in the military department or of his having brought the sum

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