The main legal point established in the judgment is the interpretation and application of the Hindu Womens Rights to Property Act, 1937, in determining the entitlement to the deceased's estate and the management of trust properties.

Leach, C.J.

1. These appeals and civil revision petitions arise out of proceedings instituted in the Court of the Subordinate Judge of Devakottah, with reference to the estate of one RM.AR.AR.RM. Arunachalam Chettiar, who died on 23rd February 1938. Appeals Nos. 321 of 1940, 3,104 and 239 of 1941 are from a preliminary decree passed by the Subordinate Judge in a suit for the administration of the estate. The petitions ask for the revision of orders passed in the suit. C. M. A. No. 282 of 1941 is against an order granting probate of a will executed by Arunachalam on 8th January 1938. These matters have been heard together and can be dealt with conveniently in one judgment.

2. The testator, who was a member of the Nattukottai Chettiar community was a very wealthy man. His personal assets have been estimated to be worth Rs. 39,66,100. He had assets in British India, Burma, Federated Malay States, Ceylon and French Cochin China. In addition, he was the trustee of numerous charities, the endowments of which are said to aggregate in value Rs. 24,00,000. He married three times. By his first wife, who predeceased him, he had a son and three daughters. The son also predeceased him. The daughters are alive and have married. His second and third wives survived him. There was no issue of the second marriage and by the third wife he had a daughter, who died during the pendency of the administration suit. His son married Umayal Achi, the plaintiff in the administration suit. There was no issue of this marriage.

3. By his will the testator nominated as his executors AR.SM.A. Sundaresan Chettiar (a cousin) and CT.L.RM. Arunachalam Chettiar (a son-in-law). He directed that his widows should each adopt a son and that the plaintiff should do likewise. Only boys approved of by the executors were to be adopted. The testator directed that certain legacies should be paid. The legacies were substantial in amount but they absorbed comparatively little of the estate. He indicated that the trusts should devolve upon his heirs, and after making other provisions to which reference is not necessary he gave these directions:

As soon as each of the adopted sons becomes a major as stated above they shall also manage the properties along with the executors.

The matters relating to charity and trust shall be kept in common and managed and as soon as all the sons become majors, the estate and the properties relating to charity and trust should be handed oven to them. They (the adopted sons) shall co-operate with each other and maintain and manage the estate in common to the extent that it is possible for them to maintain and manage it in common. At the time when they wish that a division should be effected, they may do so.

The will contains no directions with regard to the disposal of the residue of his personal estate. Neither of the widows has adopted a son, nor has his daughter-in-law.

4. On 11th July 1938 the daughter-in-law filed the suit for the administration of the estate and the partition of the assets among the heirs. The senior widow was made defendant 1, the junior widow defendant 2 and the two executors defendants 3 and 4 respectively. The plaintiff averred that the will was invalid because the testator was not in a sound state of. mind when he signed it and that the executors had exercised undue influence on him. Defendant 3 was an undischarged insolvent and it was said that defendant 4 was in indigent circumstances. She alleged that it would be disastrous to leave them in the management of the estate. She claimed that by virtue of the provisions of the Hindu Womens Rights to Property Act, 1937, she was entitled to a half share in the whole of her father-in-laws estate and defendants l and 2 to the other half. In the event of the Court holding the will to be valid there was, she said, still an intestacy with regard to the bulk of the estate. Further she claimed that sums constituting her own stridhanam and that of her deceased mother-in-law to whi