Ramamurti, J.-The second defendant in O.S. No. 99 of 1960 on the file of the Subordinate Judge, Madurai is the appellant. The ancestor of the parties was one Manicka Sankaranarayana Iyer, who died in 1928, leaving behind him five sons, (a) one Venkatachalam Iyer, the father of the first plaintiff, (b) Ramudu Iyer, the father of plaintiffs 2 to 5, (c) one Ramakrishna Iyer, the first defendant (his sons being defendants 2, 4 and 5), (d) Narasimhier, the third defendant and (e) one Lakshmana Iyer, since dead, whose widow is the sixth plaintiff. This Manicka Sankaranarayana Iyer was conducting charity and Annadanam trust and certain other charities and in order to secure efficient and proper performance of the charities, the ancestor, Manicka Sankaranarayana Iyer and his sons executed a settlement deed marked Exhibit A-. on 3rd June, 1908 The said deed inter alia provides that Sankaranarayana Iyer, the father, should be the first trustee, that after his death the senior-most male member of the family should be the trustee turns. The present first defendant is now the senior-most male member and is therefore functioning as managing trustee and looking after the trust. Certain properties had been set apart for the maintenance of the father Sankaranarayana Iyer, during his lifetime and on his death the sons became entitled to those properties. The suit O.S. No. 46 of 1955, was filed for partition and separate possession of those pro perties amongst the five branches. A preliminary decree, Exhibit A-7, dated 12th September, 1956, was passed in pursuance of a compromise and a final decree, Exhibit A-2 was also passed on 25th November, 1959. In that partition suit, O.S. No. 46 of 1955, the present first defendant, Ramakrishna Iyer, was the second plaintiff and his son Narasimhachariar, the second defendant in the present action and the appellant herein, was the third plaintiff. A Commissioner was appointed in that suit, the properties to be divided were auctioned and as per the final decree various items of properties were allotted. The final decree contained a provision for payment of the owelty after adjusting the values of the properties allotted to the various branches. The first defendant was allotted item 6 of the ‘A’ Schedule in that suit which is door No.48-A, East Avani Moola Street which is the subject-matter in the present suit. This property was auctioned by the Commissioner amongst the members of the family and it was ultimately knocked down in favour of the present first defendant for a sum of Rs. 21,500 his being the maximum bid. Exhibit A-4 dated 19th April, 1959, is the bidders’ list which shows that several members of the family participated in the auction, that the first bid commenced with a sum of Rs. 15,000 that after a particular stage the competition was between the third defendant, Narasimhier and Ramakrishna Iyer the first defendant. The third defendant’s bid ultimately was Rs. 21,150 over which the first defendant made the final bid of Rs. 21,500 which was accepted and the property also allotted to the first defendant. It is common ground that the funds of the Annadanam trust ware utilised to purchase this property, door No. 48-A, though in the beginning the first defendant made the initial 10 per cent deposit of Rs. 2,150 on the day of the auction, and later on reimbursed himself from the trust. It is again common ground that this is trust property belonging to the Annadanam trust and that the first defendant was holding and enjoying the property only as trustee. Under Exhibit B-13 dated 14th July, 1960, the first defendant sold this property as trustee and manager of the trust to his son the second defendant for Rs. 25,000. The sale deed sets out in detail the circumstances under which the trustee or manager of the trust (the first defendant) sold the property to the second defendant. Immediately thereafter, the plaintiffs objected to the sale and notices passed between the parties. The plaintiffs instituted

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