A suit for partition must include all the lands which form part of the common property and should bring before the Court all persons having right in the property.

A.N.Bhandari, J.

1. This appeal under Clause 10 of the Letters patent raises the question whether the purchaser of a co-owners share in a specific part of the common property has a right to insist that the suit for partition should include the whole of the common property and not only the specific portion of the common property sold to him.

2. One Mam Chand died some time ago leaving behind him three sons and three houses, and each of the three sons came to own one-third share in each of the three properties. Dipan who was in possession of one of these houses represented to Nihalu and Chandi defendants that this property had fallen to his share as the result of a mutual partition and that he was full owner of the said property and acting upon this representation the defendants agreed to take his property by way of exchange for another. Shortly after they had been put in possession of this house Daryao Singh a brother of Dipan, and Chandar and others, nephews of Dipan, brought a suit against the defendants for joint possession of the house in question and obtained a decree for possession of two-thirds share along with the defendants who were allowed to retain possession of the remaining one-third shave.

3. On 12-11-1954, the plaintiffs brought a suit for possession by partition of the. house which had been transferred by Dipan to the defendants. The trial Court granted a preliminary decree for possession by partition, but the learned District Judge set aside this decree on the ground that the suit had been brought only for the partition of one house and not for the partition of all the three houses belonging to the joint Hindu family or in other words that a suit for partial partition was not competent.

4. The learned Single Judge before whom the second appeal was put up for consideration was un-able to endorse this view. He held that what Dipan was selling was his house and if the plaintiffs had not succeeded in obtaining a decree for joint possession in the previous suit the defendants and Dipan might have been able to plead that they should be allowed to retain possession of thy house until partition of the entire property; but in view of the previous decree the plaintiffs were clearly entitled to have this house partitioned without including the other two houses in the suit. The learned Single Judge accordingly allowed the appeal, set aside the order of the learned District Judge and restored the decree of the trial Court. The defendants have appealed, and the question for this Court is whether the learned Single Judge has come to a correct determination in point of law.

5. Co-owners have no separate rights with respect to any distinct portion of the common property, but each is interested, according to the ex-lent of his share, in every part of the whole of such property. They are at liberty to transfer their separate interest to a stranger, including an interest in a specific part of the common property, the transferee taking the same position in relation to co-owners as was occupied by the transferor.

The transferee from such a co-owner simply steps into the shoes of the transferor, subject to all the rights of the other co-owners, but he may lose his title if the specific property conveyed to him should not be set off to him or his transferor on partition. The transferee can enforce a compulsory partition of the property in order to bring the co-ownership to an end and to hold the share in severally.

The suit for partition must however, include all the lands which form part of the common property, for a person cannot be allowed to maintain a suit in partition embracing only the part conveyed to him or to bring as many suits to partition the property as his caprice may dictate. It may thus be stated as a broad general proposition that every suit in partition should include the whole of the common property even though interests of the purchaser are confined to some specific part thereof, and should bring before th