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1963 Supreme(Mad) 76
MADRAS HIGH COURT
ANANTANARAYANAN,RAMAMURTI
Venkatarama Naidu
Versus
Jayammal
Appeal No. 180 of 1960
Decided On : 25 March, 1963
R.Rangachari and R. Raghunathan, for Appellants; D. Ramaswami Iyengar and T.R. Ramachandran, for Respondents.
A person in a fiduciary capacity cannot prescribe for title by adverse possession against the cestui que trust or the beneficiary.
Headnote:
ADVERSE POSSESSION - TRUST - LIMITATION ACT, 1908 - ART. 124 - A person in a fiduciary capacity cannot prescribe for title by adverse possession against the cestui que trust or the beneficiary. The possession of a trustee is deemed to be that of the cestui que trust, and the trustee cannot hold the property adversely to the cestui que trust after his estate as trustee has determined.
Fact of the Case:
The appellants, who were in possession of trust properties and the office of the trust, claimed to have prescribed for title by adverse possession against the plaintiffs, who were the heirs-at-law of the minor beneficiary of the trust. The appellants argued that the trust determined with the death of the minor beneficiary, and that their possession became adverse to the plaintiffs thereafter.
Finding of the Court:
The court held that the appellants could not claim to have prescribed for title by adverse possession either as against the minor beneficiary or as against his heirs-at-law. The court held that the origin of the possession pleaded by the appellants was not merely lawful, but was an origin of trust, and the assumption of fiduciary obligations. Without terminating such possession, by re-delivering possession to the trust or its then representatives, no person shall be permitted to plead, in equity, that this possession, the foundation of which is an acknowledgment of a fiduciary obligation, has become adverse without re-delivery.
Issues: Whether a person in a fiduciary capacity can prescribe for title by adverse possession against the cestui que trust or the beneficiary.
Ratio Decidendi: The court held that a person in a fiduciary capacity cannot prescribe for title by adverse possession against the cestui que trust or the beneficiary. The court held that the possession of a trustee is deemed to be that of the cestui que trust, and the trustee cannot hold the property adversely to the cestui que trust after his estate as trustee has determined.
Final Decision: The appeal was dismissed.
ANANTANARAYANAN, J.:- The appeal is instituted by the defendants in the Court below (the Court of the learned Subordinate fudge of Tiruchirapalli) in a suit for recovery of possession and future mesne profits, which was decreed as prayed for. In view of the interesting issue that has been raised in this appeal, by learned counsel tor the appellants (Sri K. Rajah Iyer) of the application of the principle of adverse possession to a person in a fiduciary capacity, who had not acquitted himself by re-delivering the property to the representative of the trust, it is important to proceed into the precise facts in some detail.
2. A certain Venkatarama Naidu had two sons, namely, Veerasami Naidu, who died in 1921, and Vengama Naidu, who died in 1924. Vengama Naidu had a son Govindaraja, who died in 1941, and a daughter, Seethammal, who died in 1943. This Govindaraja had a first wife, Jayammal, by whom he had a son, Venugopal, who died as a minor in January 1945; it will be pertinent to state that Venugopala was born in 1929. Thayarammal is the second wife of Govindaraja, and the two widows, namely, Jayammal and Thayarammal, were the plaintiffs in this suit. Seethammal, the sister of Govindaraja, had two sons, who are the defendants appellants. These are the essential relationships between the members of this family.
3. On the 1st September 1919, Veeraswami Naidu, the brother of Vengama Naidu, who died without male issue in 1921, executed a deed of settlement Ex. A.1 by virtue of which, indisputably, he settled certain endowments for the discharge of a private religious trust, or charity. In this document, besides particularising the properties so endowed, the settlor states that the details of the charities were the performance at the samadhi of Venkatachalapathi Swami in Tirupathi, and at Srilingam, of a charity of feeding bhagavatars on certain dates, and the construction of a new bhajanai matam, wherein bhajana with deepa, dhoopa, neivedyyam on specified occasions were to be performed. It is not in dispute that this settlor claims that his two wives, who had no male issue, were not properly attending to him, and that, hence, he was executing the document in favour of Vengama, imposing on his brother the obligations of the trust. It is further not in dispute that on 1-5-1935, Govindaraja, the son of Vengama, in his turn, executed another deed of settlement Ex. A.2.
The moot point is whether this deed of settlement is an augmentation of the earlier trust, or a supersession of it by the creation of what is virtually a new trust. In any event, there can be no doubt that, though Ex. A.2 is related in determinate ways to the earlier trust Ex. A.1 it is an endowment of different properties for objects that have undergone some modifications. For instance, the objects are specified to be the construction of a Venugopalaswami temple, and the performance of worship therein, in supersession of the bhajanai matam referred to in Ex. A.1.
The point whether this is an augmentation of the prior trust, or a supersession of it by the creation of a substantially new trust, is really academic, and not of great importance. In any event, after endowing the properties, the settlor, Govindaraja declared as follows :
"(Translation) Until my heirs are declared majors after my lifetime the aforesaid charities have to be performed by my elder sister, Seethammal, wife of Sivayam Konagipatti Ramakrishna Naidu, from and out of the income derived from the aforementioned properties, and thereafter my heirs should perform the aforesaid charities. If my heirs as soon as they become majors stop performing the aforesaid charities, the aforesaid elder sister and her heirs should see that the charities are performed hereditarily. If there are no heirs in my own family the aforesaid Seethammals heirs shall perform the aforesaid charities in perpetuity out of the incomes derived from those charity properties. No one else have any right over those properties."
4. One pa
