High Court of Judicature at Madras
THE HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE S. MANIKUMAR
Sridharlal
Versus
Nirdosh
C.R.P.PD. No.2712 of 2003
Decided On : 27-06-2008
Result: CRP Allowed.
1. This Civil Revision Petition is filed against the order passed by the XV Assistant City Civil Judge, Chennai in I.A. No.3636 of 2002 in O.S. No.7913 of 1997 dated 4. 2002.
2. For convenience, the parties are arrayed as found in the Suit proceedings. Facts of the case are as follows:
Respondent herein had instituted a Suit on O.S. No.7913 of 1997 before the City Civil Court, Chennai for effecting division of the suit property in six equal shares and allotment of one such share in his favour and also for a direction to the first defendant, the petitioner herein to pay mesne profit at the rate of Rs.500/-per month from the date of Plaint till the date of separate possession of his shares. The main contention of the plaintiff, who is the respondent in the present Civil Revision is that the suit schedule property is an ancestral property inherited, by his maternal uncle in the year, 1940. Thereafter, the possession and enjoyment of the property went to the hands of Tmt. Parvathi Bai, widow of the plaintiffs uncle. Even during her life time, Tmt. Parvathi Bai executed a registered Will dated 11. 1969, bequeathing the property in favour of the plaintiffs mother Tmt. Lakshmi Devi. The plaintiffs father was appointed as an executor of the Will. Till her death, the plaintiffs mother had been enjoying the suit property. After her death, the plaintiff and the defendants were put in joint possession of the property in question. Plaintiffs father pre-deceased his wife, viz. the mother of the plaintiff, who had left the plaintiff and the defendants as here legal heirs. To his shock and surprise, the plaintiff came to know of the fact that the 1st defendant, after obtaining a false legal heirship certificate in his favour, had changed the name in the electricity consumption card and in the patta register in respect of the suit property, as if the property exclusively belonged to him. While the plaintiff and the defendants were in joint possession of the property, the first defendant and the third defendant alone were enjoying the major portions of the joint family property and deriving the benefits towards rental income.
3. Hence plaintiff issued a lawyers notice to the first defendant, who in turn, according to the plaintiff had gone to the extent of even denying the blood relationship by using the legal heirship certificate obtained fraudulently and had been enjoying the property illegally. On the other hand, in his written statement, the first defendant, the revision petitioner, has alleged that the plaintiff (respondent herein) and defendants 2 to 6 were not actually born to his parents, but they were the children of one Lakshmi Devi, who was the concubine of Munmohanial and hence the plaintiff and defendants 2 to 8 cannot claim any right over the property, merely by taking advantage of the similarity in the names of the wife and concubine of the said Munmohanial. Actually, the plaintiffs mother was residing somewhere else and she was just maintained by the father of the first defendant. The plaintiff and defendants 2 to 7 are not the legal heirs of late Munmohanial and therefore they do not have any legal right in the property. The first defendant alone is entitled to the possession of the suit property. According to the first defendant, the plaintiff never succeeded to the property and there is no non-residential portion in the property as alleged by the Plaintiff and he cannot also claim mesne profits.
4. Pending Suit, the revision petitioner herein filed an Application before the Court below for rejecting the certified copy of the Will, alleged to have been filed by the plaintiff, who is the respondent in the present Revision, on the ground that marking of the certified copy of the Will which is not probated does not have validity and cannot be relied on for any purpose, especially when there are no pleadings in that regard.
5. Rebutting the averments made in the above Application, the Plaintiff/respondent in his counter
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