Appointment of a receiver to prevent dissipation of the estate due to mismanagement and debts incurred without proper evidence.

Sankaran Nair, J.

1. One Cundaswamy Chetty, the plaintiffs son, died on the 18th December 1898, intestate and without any issue, leaving his widow the defendant as his legal heir and representative. The defendant took out letters of administration and continued in possession of his property. The suit is now brought by the plaintiff, as the next reversioner, to remove her from the management of the estate and to appoint a Receiver on account of gross mismanagement add malversation by her. In her application for letters of administration and in her affidavit, the defendant stated that her husbands estate would be worth Rs. 143,873-10-7 besides the immovable property which was stated to be worth Rs. 10,800 and the debts due by the estate was stated to be about Rs. 15,785. The net amount realised by her has not been proved. But it is conceded that it was not less than Rs. l,02,953-5-4(See Exhibit L. 3). Up to December 1907 the interest that she received appears from her accounts to be not less than Rs. 23,085 and the stock of twist and other yarn, which belonged to the estate, realised about Rs. 5,330 and the deceased had about Rs. 400 cash in hand. Thus the widow received a sum of not less than Rs. 1,30,000; out of this property when the suit was brought, she had Rs. 28,000 lent to one Appavu Mudaliar, Rs. 6,000 on Government securities and Rs. 2,000 invested in certain mills besides immovable property and jewellery which is said to be worth about Rs. 6,000. She owes a debt of Rs. 10,000 to her brother and a sum of Rs. 4,000 to a firm of which her brother is the principal partner. It will thus appear that an estate which was worth over a lakh of rupees has shrunk to a little over Rs. 20,000. It is obvious, therefore, that prima facie the plaintiff has made out a case which would entitle him to take steps to prevent the property now with the defendant from being dissipated.

2. I now proceed to consider the evidence in the case. It appears that letters of administration were ordered to be issued to the defendant on the 18th April 1899 on condition of her furnishing sureties for a sum of three lakhs of rupees. Her maternal uncle one Subbaraya Chetty and one Appavu Mudaliar stood sureties for her, her maternal uncle having bound himself in the sum of Rs. 88,000 and Appavu Mudaliar in the sum of Rs. 2,25,000. It appears to have been a condition in the contract between the sureties and the widow that the sureties must be allowed to manage the estate and that the defendant should entirely abide by the advice given to her by the agents. She accordingly executed a general power-of-attorney in favour of Subbaraya Chetty and at his instance also in favour of her own brother Venkatasubba Chetty. She executed another power-of-attorney in favour of Appavu Mudaliar. It is now the defendants case that she had to pay a commission of Rs. 2,000 to her own uncle Subbaraya Chetty to persuade him to stand as a surety and a sum of Rs. 5,500 to Appavu Mudaliar and another sum of Rs. 2,000 to another man, one Ramaswamy Mudali, who was her clerk to persuade these two men to stand as sureties. Besides this payment to them for being sureties she had to pay a commission of 5 per cent. which is stated to have amounted to Rs. 4,600. Her brother was to get 1 per cent., Subbaraya Chetty was to get 1 per cant. and Appavu Mudaliar was to get 2 per cent. It is remarkable that the defendant stated on a previous occasion that the arrangement was only to pay a lump sum of Rs. 5,500 as commission only to Appavu Mudaliar and that, Subbaraya Chetty her maternal uncle was not to take any commission for himself and that therefore, it was a misappropriation by him of the sum of Rs. 2,000 when he credited himself with the said amount in the accounts of this estate. With reference to the payment to Ramaswami of the sum of Rs. 2,000 though she, no doubt, admitted the payment of Rs. 2,000 was for arranging with the sureties, she also stated that it was her maternal uncle,