The equitable doctrine of reimbursement does not apply when the party seeking reimbursement entered into the transaction with full knowledge of the circumstances and risks.

Varadachariar, J.

1. This is an appeal by the defendants against a decree which directed them to hand over possession to the plaintiff of the suit lands and pay mesne profits. The defendants right to possession rests upon Ex. K, a patta dated 31st October 1923, granted to them by the plaintiffs father. The plaintiff contends that the suit lands have been allotted to him at a partition between himself and his father and that the patta whereby, after the preliminary decree in the partition suit, the father has granted permanent occupancy rights to the defendants in what till then were homefarm lands of the estate is not binding on him. It is therefore necessary to investigate the circumstances under which this patta was granted. Plaintiffs father was the zamindar of South Vellore and in 1920 a suit for partition was instituted against the father by the plaintiffs mother acting as next friend. Allegations of gross mismanagement were made against the father and were more than justified. A preliminary decree was passed on 3rd March 1921 (Ex. J). It was the result of a compromise and its terms show that the persons who brought it about were anxious as far as possible not unnecessarily to affect the dignity of the fathers position but at the same time effectively safeguard the plaintiffs rights and prevent the father from causing any further loss to his minor son.

2. It is in evidence that the father was even by that date heavily in debt and the evidence also shows that during the pendency of the partition suit and even between the date of the preliminary decree and the final decree the father wasted all the income that he received from the estate and went on borrowing recklessly to the extent of some lakhs. Fully alive to this tendency of the father the persons responsible for the compromise decree made provision for the discharge of the debts which it was thought fit to admit as binding upon both the father and the son. These debts were specified in a schedule to that decree and totalled Rs. 6,92,000. Of these, it is necessary for the purpose of this appeal to refer only to item No. 3, a sum of Rs. 40,000 due to one Pyda Venkata-chalapathi Garu under the decree obtained by him against the father in O.S. 15 of 1920 on the file of the Ellore Sub-Court. Clause 2 of Ex. J provided that the debts specified in the schedule thereto be discharged completely by the sale of some of the estate villages; that in thus disposing of the villages the plaintiffs next friend and defendant do consult each other and sell only such of the villages as both are willing to dispose of; that necessary documents therefore be executed by the plaintiffs next friend and defendant; that if in connextion with such sale there should arise difference of opinion between plaintiffs next friend and defendant, the matter be referred to M.R. Ry., S. Hanumantha Rao Pantulu Garu, that both do abide by his decision, sell and execute the documents in accordance therewith, etc.

3. Paragraph 3 distinctly prohibited the father from contracting any further debts except in consultation with the plaintiffs next friend in circumstances of necessity. And it was added that if the defendant, i.e., the father alone, contracted any debts such debts should not bind the minor plaintiff. There can be little doubt that both on general principles now well established as to the effect of the institution of a suit for partition on behalf of a minor and especially when a decree for partition is passed therein and also according to the express terms of the compromise decree passed in the plaintiffs partition suit, the plaintiff and his father became divided in status and that after the date of Ex. J, the father could no longer have the powers which he would have as the head of the undivided Hindu family. It has no doubt been laid down in Jagannadhan Rao v. Visvesam 1924 47 Mad 621, and by a majority in Subramania Iyer v. Sabapathy Aiyar 1928 51 Mad 361 that notwithstanding the partition th