RAMASWAMI, J. :- This is an appeal preferred against the decree and judgment of the learned Subordinate Judge of South Kanara in O. S. No. 118 of 1950.

2. The facts are :- Ramakrishnaya, a retired District Registrar, and Ananda Rao, a retired Sub-Assistant Surgeon, were brothers governed by the Mitakshara Law. Both had divided themselves from the other members of the family and from each other. In 1934 Ramakrishnaya, the retired District Registrar, owned a house and garden and also some money and investment (mentioned in schedule A of the plaint) and Ananda Rao owned immovable properties described in item 2 of the plaint B schedule which he had got at partition and items 1 and 3 to 6 therein which were his self-acquisitions, and also large investments of moneys of his own.

It is common ground that Ananda Rao was a rich brother and Ramakrishnaya was a poor brother. This Ramakrishnaya was childless though he had married twice. His childless second wife Radhamma alias Kaveri is even now alive and she is the 7th defendant in the suit. Ananda Raos wife had died by 1934 and by her he had two sons living Nagasayana then aged about 13 and Hayavadana, then aged about 11, who is the husband of the plaintiff and the plaintiff after her widowhood is now pursuing her career as a medical internee.

This Ananda Rao had also five daughters and are defendants 1 to 5 in this suit. All of them have been married and some are well-to-do and some are ill-to-do. The 6th defendant is the husband of Ananda Raos daughter Tara Bai, who is the 4th defendant. This was the state of things in 1934 when Ramakrishnaya has been pressing his brother Ananda Rao to give him his younger son Hayavadana in adoption.

3. It is amply established in evidence that Ananda Rao, though willing to oblige his brother for whom he seems to have had great affection, did not want to be unjust to Hayavadana as he, Ananda Rao, was a rich man and Ramakrishnaya was comparatively poor and by giving Hayavadana in adoption and cutting him off from the family of his birth. Nagasayana would get his entire properties and Hayavadana would only get the small portion of Ramakrishnaya. The brothers consulted the then leading advocate in Madras coming from their District viz., the late well-known Government Pleader Sri B. Sitarama Rao. This correspondence is set out in Ex. A2 dated 13-5-1934. The brothers have solved for themselves this problem of giving Hayavadana in adoption and at the same time ensuring to Hayavadana one half of the properties of Ananda Rao by the legitimate Hindu Law legal device of re-union.

On 15-5-1934 the brothers entered into a registered family agreement (Ex.A 3) which runs as follows :-

"Under the Palu Nishoodi (partition deed) jointly entered into and got registered in the year 1894 by the first and second individuals among us, and their other brothers viz., Srinivas Upadhyaya and Krishna Rao and also our father, the first individual got himself divided from the other members of the family. Further, in the year 1916, he retired on pension from the District Registrars post; and in the year 1918, when his first wife Munamma died, he married again (a second wife) named Kaveri alias Radhamma and he has been living with her in a separate house at the said place, Kambala.

After the death of father of individuals Nos. 1 and 2 in the year 1903, the second individual and the two individuals mentioned above, who were living together, jointly entered into a partition deed. The second individual who acquired a share under the same has been from the date of his retirement in 1932 on Government pension from the Assistant Surgeons post, residing in a separate house in the said place, Alke, along with his minor sons. His wife Padmavathi, has died and his five daughters have also been got married.

All the properties such as movable, immovable and cash belonging to the first individual are his self-acquisitions and they belong to him as his own. Out of the properties belonging to the