JUDGMENT :

D.M. Patnaik, J. - Plaintiff is in appeal before this Court against the reversing judgment of the lower appellate Court in a suit for declaration of title and recovery of possession.

2. The dispute relates to 9 plots measuring a total area of Ac. 0. 045 decs Plaintiff claims that his lather Gouranga was recorded in respect of these lands In the record- of- rights of the 1923-24 settlement. After his death and long before the present suit there was partition in the family among the three brothers of which plaintiff is t e eldest one and his case is that in that partition the suit property fell to his share and ha has been in possession of the suit land in his own right, title and interest till 1972 when the defendants 7 and 8 and his other aasociates created trouble in his possession for which a case u/s 145, Cr PC was initiated at his instance in Misc. Case No. 43 of 1972 which was ultimately decided against him and the defendants 1 and 3 to 9 were declared to be in possession of the land and there- fore, he filed the suit.

3. Though the defendants filed a joint written statement, while denying the material facts pleaded in the plaint, it was specifically pleaded by defenda