Court's jurisdiction in rejecting a plaint is limited to the averments within it, and cannot be influenced by extrinsic documents or biases regarding legitimacy of claims.

JUDGMENT :

C.V.KARTHIKEYAN, J.

1. The plaintiffs in O.S.No.97 of 2019 on the file of the I Additional District Court [PCR], Tiruchirappalli, are the appellants herein. They have filed the present Appeal Suit challenging the order dated 30.06.2020 passed in I.A.No.2 of 2019. The said Interlocutory Application had been filed under Order VII Rule 11 and Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure, seeking rejection of the plaint on the grounds that it was barred by res judicata, and also for non-compliance by the plaintiffs with the Court’s direction to value the suit as per Section 37 (1) of the Tamil Nadu Court-Fees and Suits Valuation Act, 1955, and to pay Court fees on the market value of the suit property.

2. By order dated 30.06.2020, the learned I Additional District Judge [PCR], Tiruchirappalli, allowed I.A.No.2 of 2019 and rejected the plaint in O.S.No.97 of 2019.

3. Challenging the said order, the plaintiffs have preferred the present Appeal Suit.

4. O.S.No.97 of 2019 was filed by two brothers and two sisters/four plaintiffs seeking a judgment and decree against the defendants for partition of the suit property into eight equal shares, allotment of four such shares to the plaintiffs, delivery of possession of their respective shares, a direction to the defendants to pay the plaintiffs their share of past profits for the three years preceding the date of the suit, and future profits from the date of the suit till delivery of possession, along with costs.

5. The plaintiffs claimed to be the sons and daughters of one M.Devaraj, who, according to them, died intestate on 01.11.2007. They asserted that they were born to Devaraj through his second wife, Annabai, who was alive at the time of the institution of the suit.

6. The suit was filed against Ponnacharammal, who was arrayed as the first defendant, whom the plaintiffs claimed to be the first wife of M.Devaraj, and also against her three daughters, who were arrayed as defendants 2 to 4. The plaintiffs further impleaded defendants 6 to 12, who were stated to be purchasers of various portions of the suit property. The fifth defendant was described as the Power of Attorney Agent of defendants 1 to 4 and, in exercise of the said power, was alleged to have executed sale deeds in favour of defendants 6 to 12 in respect of portions of the suit property.

7. In the plaint, it was further averred that the suit property comprised land and building measuring 0.76 cents in T.S.Nos.847, 848, 849, and 850, situated in Puthur Village within the Woraiyur Sub-Registration District and within the limits of the Trichy City Corporation. It was contended that the said property had been allotted to Devaraj under a Partition Deed dated 17.10.1973, executed between him and his father, Muthusamy.

8. It was further contended that the property which had fallen to the share of Muthusamy was also subsequently inherited by Devaraj. The plaintiffs claimed that Devaraj had no male children through his first wife, Ponnacharammal (first defendant), and that he subsequently married their mother, Annabai, through whom the plaintiffs were born.

9. It was contended that the suit property was the joint family property of Devaraj and, since it had not been divided by metes and bounds, the plaintiffs, as his sons and daughters, were entitled to an undivided 4/8 share therein. It was further contended that defendants 1 to 4 had no independent right to alienate the property, and that the purported sale deeds executed by them were invalid in the eyes of law and