The main legal point established in the judgment is that the adoption was invalid due to the lack of consent from the senior widow and the simultaneous adoption by two widows being contrary to Hindu law.

Wadsworth, J.

1. This appeal raises the question of the validity of an adoption. The properties in question formed part of the estate of one Sampanghi Rame Gowdu who had a son Byre Gowdu. The father and the son separated and it was agreed as one of the terms of the partition that the fathers estate should be held during his lifetime by his second wife Lakshmakkal and on her death should go to Byre Gowdu, the son by the first wife. Lakshmakkal during her lifetime transferred those properties to her nephew the first defendant. Byre Gowdu had two wives, the first was the plaintiff and the second was one Ramakkal. Neither of them had any children. Byre Gowdu died in 1909 leaving a will which concludes with the following sentence:

...if after my lifetime, both of you (that is, the two wives) do not agree to live together dividing the said properties into two equal shares, you shall separately make adoptions....

2. Apparently this was regarded as giving each of the widows power to adopt without regard to the other. At any rate in 1909 shortly after the death of Byre Gowdu, the junior widow, Ramakkal adopted the second defendant. There is no doubt about the fact of the adoption, which is embodied in a deed, Ex. II. At the time of the adoption, the two wives who are sisters were living together. The plaintiff made no objection to the adoption; but it has been found as a fact that she did not consent to it. The adopted son lived with the two widows for ; many years without his status being questioned. However, after the first defendant got a transfer of Lakshmakkals property, he also got a surrender from the second defendant of the latters interest thereon. Ramakkal died in 1950 and Lakshmakkal died in 1932. Byre Gowdus father had died long before. So that at the time of the suit there were living, the plaintiff who is the senior widow of Byre Gowdu, the second defendant adopted by the junior widow Ramakkal and the first defendant, the nephew and transferee of Byre Gowdus fathers second wife.

3. We are no longer concerned with the plaintiffs right to the half of Lakshmakkals property which goes to her as the widow of her husband. The appeal relates only to the right of the plaintiff to the half of the property which would have devolved upon Ramakkal had she been alive When Lakshmakkal died and is now claimed to have devolved upon the first defendant by reason of the surrender by the second defendant, the adopted son of Ramakkal.

4. The main question in the appeal is whether this adoption was valid. Fortunately there is no longer any difficulty about the facts and the only trouble relates to the effect of the provision in Byre Gowdus will, Ex. B, which has already been extracted authorising each of the widows to adopt. It seems to me that this difficulty can be resolved by reference to authorities. The Privy Council in Akhoy Chunder Bagchi v. Kalapahar Haji dealing with a case in which two widows were each authorised to make adoptions and in pursuance of that authority made simultaneous adoptions, held firstly that the instrument should be construed on the assumption that the person giving the authority intended his widows to do that which the law allowed and not to do something which was if not absolutely illegal, very unusual and not practiced among Hindus. Secondly, their Lordships held that simultaneous adoptions by two widows were contrary to law.

5. Next there is the case of Bijoy Krishna Karmakar v. Ranjit Lal Karmakar I.L.R (1911) 38 Cal. 694, the decsion being confirmed in appeal by the Bench whose judgment is reported in Ranjit Lal Karmakar v. Bijoy Krishna Karmakar I.L.R(1912) 39 Cal. 582. That case concerned an instrument which authorised two widows to act according to their religious tenets by adopting three sons successively. It was held following the Privy Council decision just cited that the instrument must be read not as authorising an illegal simultaneous adoption but as giving power of adoption to the widows success