JUDGMENT :

These second appeals are preferred by the plaintiff. She has laid a suit for partition of three items of properties. The suit was partially decreed by the trial court, challenging which decree the first defendant’s branch (defendants 8 to 12) preferred a first appeal in A.S.156 of 2003, in which the plaintiff had preferred her cross objection. The first appellate court allowed the appeal and dismissed the cross objection, which implied that the suit was dismissed in its entirety. Aggrieved by the said decrees of the first appellate court, the plaintiff has approached this court with these appeals. Parties would be referred to by their rank in the trial court.

The Pleadings:

2.1 The Plaintiff’s case:

There are three items of suit properties and they were the self-acquired properties of a certain Chennimalai Gounder. He was married to Valliammal, and the couple had a son Appasamy (the first defendant) and a daughter Nachammal. Nachammal died in 1963. A decade later, on 26.06.1973, Chennimalai Gounder died and he died intestate, leaving him surviving his widow Valliammal, his only son Appasamy Gounder, the first defendant, and heirs of his predeceased daughter, the plaintiff a