1920 (6) TMI 2

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..... provisions to the widow. The application was opposed by Madhab Misser, a first cousin of Nanu, who, at that time, was the nearest agnate, and upon the assumption that the will was inoperative, was the nearest reversioner according to Hindu law. Letters were, however, granted in respect that the will had been properly executed. Madhab Misser then raised a civil suit to have a declaration that the will was inoperative and that the property having been joint was succeeded to by the son; that upon his death the mother became entitled to a woman's interest, and that on her death when it happened the estate would devolve on the reversioner then entitled. This suit was opposed by the daughters and by the mother. The suit came on for trial bef .....

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..... 3. In the suit, as originally framed, the plaintiffs, now the appellants, alleged that the compromise was a fraudulent scheme between the respondents and the deceased Madhab Misser to divide the estate between them. This was found against them by the learned District Judge, and in the Appeal Court the contention was deliberately abandoned. The question, therefore, came to be simply this---were the compromise and the arrangements thereby sanctioned within the powers of the parties? 4. The power of a widow (and a mother succeeding to her son is in the same position) to deal with the estate with the consent of the nearest reversioner at the time was very fully examined by this Board in the recent case of Rangasami Gounden v. Nachiappa Gounde .....

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..... which she had only a widow's interest, the surrender here was total not partial. 6. Then as regards the second, it has been already pointed out that the bona fides of the transaction is not now challenged. Is it then a device to divide the property between the lady and the reversioner? Now their Lordships do not doubt that to make an arrangement such a device, it is not necessary that the lady surrendering should take part of the property directly. An arrangement, by which the reversioner as a consideration for the surrender promised to convey a portion of the property to a nominee or nominees of the lady surrendering, might well fall under the description of a device to divide the estate. It is here that the fact of the arrangement b .....

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