Settlement conferring absolute or limited estate on settlee.

This second appeal is brought from the judgment of the Subordinate Judge of Tuticorin setting aside the decree of the trial Court giving the relief to the plaintiffs as prayed for. The material facts of the case are these: One Sankaralinga had two sons, Ramaswami and Arunachala, and three daughters, the plaintiffs in the present suit. His two sons were demented He was anxious that his sons should get married in spite of their being insane Arunachala was first married to one Pulamadi and as she died Sankaralinga wanted to get Arunachala married a second time. For that purpose he approached the parents of one Sivanananji. The latter were not willing to give Sivanananji in marriage to Arunachala unless some properties were settled upon the girl before marriage. Accordingly Sankaralinga executed a settlement deed conveying the suit properties to Sivanananji. It is this document that falls to be considered in this second appeal.

Sankaralinga died early in 1930. During his lifetime he made a gift of several items of property to his daughters, the present plaintiffs, and after his death Rama swarm by his wife as his guardian, instituted a suit for partition of the family properties ignoring the gifts in favour of the present plaintiffs. In that suit the present suit properties were not included. Ultimately the suit ended in a compromise and under the terms of the compromise the title of the plaintiffs to the suit properties was recognised and affirmed.

Neither Ramaswami nor Arunachala had any issue. Ramaswami died in the year 1931 and Arunachala in 1935. Subsequent to the death of Arunachala, Sivanananji alienated the properties in favour of the various defendants in the suit. The present suit is filed challenging the alienations on the ground that Sivanananji was given only a life estate under the settlement deed Exhibit B-11 of her father-inlaw and therefore these alienations are void beyond the lifetime of Sivanananji who died in January, 1945.

The main defence to the suit was that Sivanananji was given an absolute estate under Exhibit B-11 and that in any event since the absolute right of their predecessors-in-interest to the suit properties was recognised by way of family arrangement in the earlier suit by these plaintiffs, it is not open to the plaintiffs to question the validity of the sales in their favour.

The trial Court decreed the suit holding that under the settlement deed in question Sivanananji got only a life estate with the result the defendants did not acquire any right to these properties by virtue of the sales in their favour It was also of opinion that the compromise decree in the earlier suit did not recognise the absolute title of Sivanananji to the suit properties.

On appeal, the Subordinate Judge took a different view of the nature of the estate conferred upon Sivanananji by her father-in-law and dismissed the suit. while agreeing with the District Munsif on the question of the family arrangement The plaintiffs aggrieved by this decision have preferred this second appeal.

Mr. Rama Ayyar, in support of the appeal urged that the view of the Subordinate Judge that an absolute estate was conferred upon Sivanananji is unsound and opposed to the tenor of the document. The question for decision in this second appeal depends upon the construction to be placed on Exhibit B-11. It therefore becomes necessary to set out in extenso Exhibit B-11:

“Whereas Pulamadi Ammal alias Sudalai Muthu Animal had already been married to my junior son Arunachalam Pillai, a person of unsound mind as his first wife whereas she is dead, whereas I requested these five individuals viz., your mother Pechiammal Ammal and you brothers Sankaralingam Pillai, Kanthimathinatha Pillai, Thangiah Pillai and Subbiah Pillai to give you in marriage to my said son Arunachalam Pillai of unsound mind as his second wife; whereas they agreed to the same and whereas I have on this day in accordance with their request conveyed to you under this settleme