Ramaprasada Rao, CJ. — This Letters Patent Appeal comes up before us, after leave has been granted by Sethuraman, J., permitting an appeal to be filed against his judgment in S.A. No. 81 of 1973. In the second appeal the learned Judge also considered an application filed by the plaintiff to amend the plaint, whereunder the plaintiff sought for possession of the suit properties. We shall reserve consideration of this part of the Judgment of the learned Judge, relating to the allowance of the application for amendment of the plaint, at a later stage.

2. The relevant facts which led to this appeal may briefly be stated. Alagiriswami Chettiar was the original owner of the suit properties. Under a will, dated 20th August, 1929 (Exhibit B-8), he bequeathed the suit properties in favour of his daughter, Kuppammal. Kuppammal, after she became the owner of the properties made a will, Exhibit B-9, dated 2nd August, 1933, in favour of her mother, Meenakshi Ammal. Meenakshi Ammal executed Exhibit A-1, dated 14th October, 1946, the terms and tenor of which are the subject-matter of this appeal. Under Exhibit A-1, Meenakshi Ammal, while styling the instrument as a “settlement deed”, inter alia, provided that she should enjoy the properties during her lifetime and that thereafter the properties should devolve upon Velappan, the first plaintiff, in the suit for life. She also set out in detail the immediate provocation which prompted her to settle the properties on the first plaintiff, Velappan. Kuppammal, the daughter of the settlor under Exhibit A-1 brought up one Muniammal, who was the daughter of Kup-pammal’s co-widow and, according to Meenakshi Ammal, Kuppammal had expressed a desire that she should benefit Velapplan, who had married Muniammal. It was to propitiate Kuppammal, who had bequeathed the property to her that Meenakshi Ammal purported to settle the properties on Velappan, the first plaintiff in the suit. In the course of our judgment, we shall refer to the specific recitals in Exhibit A-1, to bring out its true import and intendment. If appears that Meenakshi Ammal, just two days before her death, revoked the settlement, deed, Exhibit A-1, which was not revokable as per its terms, and executed a will, Exhibit B-13, on 26th April, 1970. Under Exhibit B-13 she bequeathed the suit properties to the first defendant. The first plaintiff would aver that by virtue of the recitals in Exhibit A-1, he is entitled to the suit properties, that he was performing the charities as per the recitals in the deed, along with Meenakshi Ammal, when she was alive, thereafter by himself, that he leased out the suit lands to the second plaintiff and that because of interference by defendants 2 to 5, who alleged that they had secured a lease of the suit properties from the first defendant, the first plaintiff, impleading also the second plaintiff, has filed the present suit for a declaration of the first plaintiff’s title to the suit properties and for an injunction restraining the defendants from interfering with their possession and enjoyment of the suit properties.

3. The first defendant resisted the action on the ground that Exhibit A-1 was only a sham and nominal document, that, in any event, the said instrument, though styled as a settlement, was only a will, and that as Meenakshi Ammal revoked the said will under Exhibit B-13 dated 26th April, 1970, the later will, Exhibit B-13, would prevail as the last will and testament of. Meenakshi Ammal. Regarding the possession of defendants 2 to 5, the first defendant and the other defendants would contend that the suit properties had been leased out to the second defendant as well as the fifth defendant’s husband, that the fifth defendant continued in possession in that capacity on the death of her husband, that defendants 3 and 4 were the pannayals of the second defendant, that therefore the suit for injunction was not maintainable and that, even so, the suit for declaration of title in favour of the fir

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