These appeals under section 51 of Act XXVI of 1948 are directed against the orders of the Estates Abolition Tribunal, Madurai, in O.P. Nos. 167 1951 and 170 of 1951, rejecting the claim of the respective appellants for a share in the compensation amount. Sivagiri in the Tirunelveli District was an ancient impartible estate ; and it was also included in the Schedule to the Madras Impartible Estates Act (II of 1904). On the passing of the Madras Estates (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act (XXVI of 1948), which hereafter shall be referred to as the Act, the Sivagiri Estate was taken over by the Government as and from 3rd January, 1951, the date of the notification. An advance compensation of Rs. 2,40,000 was deposited by the Government with the Chairman of the Estates Abolition Tribunal.

Senthattikalai Pandian Chinnathambiar, the previous Zamindar of Sivagiri Estate, died in 1934, leaving his surviving 7 sons, born of lawful wedlock and one Chinnadurai alias Ramachandran, the appellant in S.T.A. No. 138 of 1954, who was born of his continuously kept concubine. On the death of the Zamindar, the eldest of the legitimate sons, Varaguna Pandian, suceeded to the Zamindan