The main legal point established in the judgment is that an assignment of an insurance policy can constitute a present transfer under the Transfer of Property Act, and the rights of the assignee are determined based on the language and intent of the assignment.

Varadachariar, J.

1. The only question for decision in this Miscellaneous Appeal is whether certain insurance policy amount which has been sought to be attached by the respondent decree-holder can be held to be "assets" of the late Kerala Varma Raja in the hands of the appellant.

2. The appellant is the widow of Kerala Varma Raja. The policy in question was an endowment policy obtained by the deceased in 1927 and was payable on the 5th April, 1952, or on the death of the assured earlier. On the 3rd July, 1933, the assured assigned this policy by an endorsement on the policy itself. This assignment was duly communicated to the insurance company and there registered, though as usual the company guarded itself from admitting the validity of the assignment. The assured died in 1933 and the decree under execution was passed against the appellant as his legal representative. The question does not now arise between the company and the assignee but between the assignee and a person who has obtained a decree against the assets of the assured.

3. The Court of first instance released the policy amount from attachment on the ground that by reason of the assignment the policy amount belonged to the assignee and did not form part of the estate of the assured at his death. The learned District Judge reversed this decision on the ground that the assignment was not an absolute or outright assignment taking effect at once but was only contingent; he thought it followed that the amount due to the assured under the policy formed part of the estate of the deceased. The decision of the learned District Judge is opposed to the judgment of this Court in Yacoob Sahib v. Pacha Bibi (1915) 38 I.C. 248. The only other reported decision on the point which has been brought to our notice is a decision of the Sind Judicial Commissioners Court in Shamdas v. Savitribai A.I.R. 1937 Sind 181 and the principle of that decision is also in favour of the appellants contention.

4. Learned Counsel for the respondent has contended that the endorsement on the policy is no more than a mandate or at best it operates only as a testamentary transfer and that no interest in the policy passed to the assignee during the lifetime of the assignor. He also repeated the argument which had found favour with the lower Court that the words of transfer did not amount to an absolute interest. The endorsement, which appears in a usual form suggested by the company, runs as follows:

In consideration of natural love and affection, I do hereby assign the benefit of all moneys to become payable Under the policy (reserving, to myself the right to receive in cash or apply in reduction of premia any bonuses that may be declared upon such policy from time to time) to my wife and declare that her receipt shall be a sufficient discharge to the company for the same, provided however that in the event of my wife predeceasing me or-in the event of my surviving the date on which the said policy, if so expressed, would mature, the benefit of the policy and the right to receive moneys thereunder shall revert to me as if this assignment has not been made.

5. In support of the first contention, respondents learned "Counsel relied upon the judgment of the Court of Appeal in England in In re Williams : Williams v. Ball (1917) 1 Ch. 1 and on some-observations of the Rangoon High Court in Ma Nu v. Ma Gun I.L.R.(1924) 2 Rang. 388. The language of the document which the Court had to construction the English case was quite different. The very point made in that connection in the English case was that the endorsement relied on did not purport to assign at all but only purported to authorise the named person to draw the insurance amount in. the event of the assured predeceasing her. It was significant that no notice of the so-called assignment had even been given to the insurance company in that case. Astbury, J., held that there were no present words of gift at all. In the Court of Appeal, the learned-Judges w