O R D E R

(This case has been heard through video conference)

This revision petition has been filed seeking to set aside the fair and decreetal order dated 22.8.2016 passed in I.A.No.496 of 2016 in O.S.No.135 of 2015 on the file of the Principal District Munsif, Kanchipuram.

2. The first defendant in O.S.No.135 of 2015 on the file of the Principal District Munsif, Kanchipuram is the revision petitioner.

3. The respondent herein, who is the own brother of the revision petitioner had filed the suit for a declaration that the plaintiff is having preemptive right to purchase the suit property and for a consequential relief of permanent injunction against the first defendant/revision petitioner restraining him and his men and agents from in any way alienating the suit property. The plaintiff had claimed that though the suit property stands in the individual name of the revision petitioner as per registered sale deed dated 7.11.1979, at the time of such purchase, he was only about 18 years old and hence, the question of self acquisition of the property by the first defendant will not arise and the suit property is also a joint family property. The plaintiff claimed that he has got sentimental value and emotional attachment with the joint family and therefore, he wants to purchase it.

4. The revision petitioner/first defendant had filed a petition under Order VII Rule 11(a) read with Section 151 CPC seeking to reject the plaint on the ground that it does not disclose any cause of action. He had taken a stand that when the suit property was purchased, he was 20 years old and he paid the sale consideration. It is his further case that in a family partition which took place in the year 1981, his separate title in the suit property was recognized and it was left out of the family partition. The plaintiff has also not filed any suit for partition of the suit property by treating it as a joint family property except claiming for a declaration of the preemptive right to purchase as if the suit property is a joint family property. Therefore, the plaintiff is estopped from questioning the proprietary interest in the suit property as exclusive owner thereof. The plaintiff had not filed any suit questioning the correctness of the partition that took place in the year 1981 and therefore, he has no cause of action to file the suit. The right of preemption under Section 22(1) of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 is not available to the plaintiff in respect of the suit property as it is the self acquired property of the first defendant. As none of the parties to the partition of the year 1981 has come forward to claim a share in the suit property, the plaintiff is now estopped from questioning the character of the suit property as, by his conduct, he had admitted the separate title of the revision petitioner/first defendant in the suit property. The plaintiff not being a co-sharer or co-owner of the suit property, the preemption right to purchase the suit property will not be available under Section 22(1) of the Hindu Succession Act, 1956. Since the plaint does not disclose any cause of action for the declaration of preemptive right to purchase the suit property, it has to be rejected.

5. The Trial Court, by order dated 22.8.2016, dismissed the petition considering the pleading made in the plaint that the suit property was purchased from the nucleus of joint family and that the age of the first defendant at the time of purchase was only eighteen and therefore, there are considerable issues in the suit for deciding only after conclusion of the trial. Aggrieved against the same, the first defendant has come up with the present revision.

6. Learned counsel appearing for the petitioner would submit that the suit itself is not maintainable either in law or on facts. He would submit that the suit property is the self acquired property of the revision petitioner/first defendant as evidenced by the sale deed Ex.P2 of the year 1979 and he was 20 years old at the re