The plaintiff, who is the appellant, brought the suit out of which this appeal arises for a declaration of his title to the suit properties and for possession of the same from the first defendant, the State of Madras. The second defendant is the plaintiff’s brother. The plaintiff and the second defendant are the sons of one Kasinatha Rao and his wife Rama Bai. The properties in dispute in this suit admittedly belonged to one Singaravelu Pillai who died issueless in February, 1943. He was keeping one Dhanabhagyam as his permanent concubine, and by him she gave birth to two sons, Jagannathan and Saminathan. Dhanabhagyam and Saminathan left the village about the year 1930 and have not since been heard of. There is no controversy about that fact. ‘After the death of Singaravelu, there were disputes in regard to these properties between his illegitimate son Jagannathan on the one hand, and the deceased’s brother Krishnaswami Pillai on the other. That led to the filing of a suit by Jagannathan against Krishnaswami in O.S. No. 60 of 1943 in which various contentions were put forward by Krishnaswami. All those contentions were overruled by the learned District Munsif, Mayuram, who