Delhi District Court
Maya Devi vs Ravi Prakash on 15 October, 2020
IN THE COURT OF SH. PRASHANT SHARMA:
ADDITIONAL DISTRICT JUDGE05: WEST DISTRICT:
TIS HAZARI COURTS: DELHI
Civ DJ/60720/16
1. Maya Devi
W/o Sh. Ravi Prakash
2. Master Gulshan Kumar (Minor Son)
3. Baby Khushboo (Minor Daughter)
Through :
Natural Guardian Mother
Smt. Maya Devi
All Residents of :
A14, Gali No. 1, Opp. Metro Parking
J.J. Colony, Madipur, Delhi.
Also At :
A1/64, Sultan Puri
Delhi 110034.
..... Appellants
Vs.
1. Ravi Prakash
S/o Late Sh. Kanheya Lal
2. Tohfa Devi
W/o Late Sh. Kanheya Lal
Both R/o A14, Gali No. 1
Opp. Metro Parking, J.J. Colony
Madipur, Delhi.
..... Respondents
Date of Institution : 25.07.2015
Reserved For Order On : 07.10.2020
Date of Decision : 15.10.2020
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 1 / 9
JUDGEMENT
1. Appellants namely Smt. Maya Devi, Master Gulshan Kumar and Baby Khushboo, have filed the present appeal against respondents namely Sh. Ravi Prakash and Smt. Tohfa Devi, thereby challenging the judgement and decree dated 04.03.2015, passed by Ld. Trial Court in Civil Suit No. 60/13.
2. In my subsequent paragraphs, appellants who were plaintiffs before Ld.Trial Court, will be referred as plaintiffs and respondents who were defen dants before Ld. Trial Court, will be referred as defendants, in order to avoid any confusion.
3. Plaintiffs as per record had filed the suit for permanent and mandatory injunction alleging the following facts : "That plaintiff no. 1 is the wife of defendant no. 1 and daughterinlaw of defendant no. 2. Plaintiff no. 2 and 3 are the children of plaintiff no. 1 and defendant no. 1. After her marriage, plaintiff no. 1 started residing in her matrimonial home i.e. property no. A14, admeasuring 22 sq. yards in Gali No. 1, JJ Colony, Madipur, Delhi (hereinafter referred as 'suit property in question'). Said property was allotted to fatherinlaw of plaintiff no. 1 namely Late Sh. Kanhiya Lal during his lifetime by concerned authority under the scheme of re settlement of JJ Colony and Slum, Delhi. In that manner, Late Sh. Kanhiya Lal during his life time had become the owner of suit property in question.
Sh. Kanhiya Lal had expired intestate on
16.06.1995 without executing any document
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 2 / 9
transferring the title of suit property in question in favour of any person. With the passage of time, relations between plaintiff no. 1 and defendants became strained. As a result of which that, plaintiff no. 1 started residing in her parental home with plaintiff no. 2 and plaintiff no. 3. She claimed that defendants in collusion with each other had beaten her on various occasion and as a result of that various criminal cases were filed by her in different competent courts. Further, defendants tried to sell out the suit property in question on 21.02.2013 when plaintiff came to know that defendants had accepted the earnest money as they were planning to sell out the suit property. It was claimed that defendant no. 1 and 2 had no exclusive right, title and interest over suit property in question and they could not sell off the suit property without the consent of the plaintiffs as per law. Further, it was claimed that Late Sh. Kanhiya Lal during lifetime had lastly wished that suit property must be enjoyed by his grand children i.e. plaintiff no. 2 and 3 and that said property must not be sold by anybody.
Coupled with the same, plaintiffs claimed that suit property in question could not have been sold by defendants as per rules of the resettlement JJ Colony, Slum, Delhi. As per plaintiffs, Government had the right in such type of properties and their successors have no right to sell the suit property Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 3 / 9 without taking consent from the concerned authorities. Plaintiffs claimed that defendant no. 1 never maintained them and that is why, plaintiff no. 1 had filed the petition for maintenance against defendant no.1 which are pending decision in concerned Court. Plaintiffs finally prayed the following reliefs :
1. To pass a decree for permanent and mandatory injunction against the defendants by restraining them for selling the suit property forever without consent of the plaintiffs.
2. To pass a decree for permanent and mandatory injunction by directing defendants to allow the plaintiffs to enter and reside into the suit premises and not to disturb their peaceful possession.
3. To direct the defendants to give separate portion to the plaintiffs to live in the suit premises without any disturbance.
4. Ld. Trial Court vide order dated 04.03.2015 dismissed the suit, against which plaintiff has moved this Court by way of present Appeal.
5. Alongwith the appeal, plaintiffs filed an application U/Sec. 5 of the Limitation Act, for condoning the delay in filing the present appeal. In the said application, it is stated that plaintiffs were not informed about the judge ment and decree and questioned by their previous counsel in May, 2015. They appointed Sh. Anil Kumar Yadav, as their fresh counsel in July, 2015. Said counsel inspected the file and record of this case and obtained the certified copy of judgement and decree in question. Consequently, present appeal was preferred.
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 4 / 96. Plaintiffs nowhere mentioned the exact number of days which have to be condoned by this Court in the said application U/Sec. 5 of the Limitation Act. As per law, present appeal should have been filed within 30 days of pass ing the impugned judgement and decree which ended on 05.04.2015. Present appeal was filed on 25.07.2015. There is evident delay of 110 days. Be that as may, considering the fact that plaintiffs had engaged new counsel before Ld. Trial Court for pursuing their case and considering the fact that such like ap plications have to be liberally construed, said application stands allowed. De lay of 110 days in filing the present appeal stands condoned and said applica tion U/Sec. 5 of the Limitation Acts, stands allowed.
7. Coming to the merits of the appeal, I find that in the grounds of ap peal, plaintiffs have claimed that Ld. Trial Court has failed to appreciate that plaintiffs became cosharer in the suit property in question after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal. They claimed that they are entitled for share in the sale pro ceeds of sale of suit property in question. Further, they claimed that defen dants did not lead any evidence and had sold the suit property in question against the principles of law and violated the Court order. Hence, they prayed that impugned judgement and decree be set aside.
8. Arguments on appeal, heard and matter was reserved for pronounce ment of judgement.
9. The sole issue which needs adjudication in the present appeal is, whether plaintiffs have or have not any legal right over suit property in ques tion ? It is on the basis of answer to the said question that reliefs can be or cannot be granted to plaintiffs.
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 5 / 910. Admittedly, suit property in question was exclusively owned by Late Sh. Kanhiya Lal during his lifetime. PW3 Mahender Kumar Sharma, UDC, Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board from office of Assistant Director, North Zone (B), Shakar Pur, New Delhi110034, in his testimony categorically deposed that Late Sh. Kanhiya Lal was the owner of suit property in question as per Government record. So, suit property in question was not an ancestral property of Sh. Kanhiya Lal. It was the self acquired property of Sh. Kanhiya Lal. If that is so, then after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal who had died intes tate, suit property in question devolved upon his Class I legal heir which in cluded defendants only. Ld. Trial Court in the impugned judgement specifi cally concluded that after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal, right over suit prop erty in question devolved upon defendants to the exclusion of plaintiffs. As such, plaintiffs had not inherited any share in the suit property in question af ter the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal. The aforesaid finding of Ld. Trial Court was legally correct.
11. Further, plaintiff no. 1 admittedly is the daughter in law of Late Sh.
Kanhiya Lal. She has no independent right, title or interest over suit property in question which is the self acquired property of Sh. Kanhiya Lal. Said suit property cannot be termed as shared household within the definition of shared household in Sec. 2 (s) of the Domestic Violence Act. In coming to the aforesaid conclusion, reliance is placed upon the case law of Hon'ble Apex Court titled as S.R. Batra & Anr. Vs. Taruna Batra, Case Appeal (Civil) No. 5837/06 decided on 15.12.2006.
12. So far as plaintiff no. 2 and 3 are concerned, they have no independent right over suit property in question after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal who had died intestate, in the wake of the fact that Sh. Kanhiya Lal was survived by de fendants who are ClassI legal heir.
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 6 / 913. The claim of plaintiffs that they are cosharer in suit property in ques tion, therefore, is legally not correct. It is therefore, discarded by me.
14. Further, the claim of plaintiffs that defendants did not lead any evi dence for proving their case, is also meritless argument as right of filing of Written Statement by defendants was closed by Ld. Trial Court. Meaning thereby, there was no defence of defendants which had to be proved by defen dants. Even otherwise, there was no issue which had to be proved by defen dants based on their defence. Therefore, there was no need to lead any evi dence by defendants in this case.
15. It is settled law that the case of plaintiffs has to stand on its own legs.
Plaintiffs cannot take benefit of shortcomings of case of defendants. In this case also, plaintiffs failed to prove their legal right over suit property in ques tion.
16. In addition to aforesaid reasoning, I find that case of plaintiffs fault ered, for the reason that their pleadings, did not inspire confidence. The pleadings were improbable in nature.
17. To start with, it was not mentioned in the plaint and in the evidence of plaintiffs, as to since when plaintiffs were residing in matrimonial home of plaintiff no. 1. Coupled with the same, plaintiffs had claimed that they had come to know about the collusion of defendants to sell the suit property in question, through reliable sources of locality. "Reliable sources of locality"
was never explained by plaintiffs. In addition to that, plaintiffs had categori cally claimed in their pleadings and evidence that Sh. Kanhiya Lal was the ex clusive owner of suit property in question. In the same breath, they had claimed that Government had the right over suit property in question and it cannot be sold by the allottee without taking prior permissions from the con Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 7 / 9 cerned departments. Both the said pleas were contradictory to each other. Reason being that once a person has become owner of a particular immovable property, he gets the right to deal with the said property in whatever the way he wants, which includes the right to sell that property. That right cannot be curbed by any rule or regulation. In case, said right is curbed by any rule and regulation, then that person cannot be said to be "exclusive owner" of that property. So, Sh. Kanhiya Lal if had become owner of suit property in ques tion, had got the right to sell off the suit property in question and Government as such had no say in the said sale proceedings. Similar right devolved upon legal heirs of Sh. Kanhiya Lal after his death i.e. defendants. Meaning thereby, defendants had become exclusive owner of suit property in question after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal and that defendants got the right to sell off the suit property in question after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal being ClassI legal heirs as per the mandate of Sec. 6 of Hindu Succession Act.
18. Plaintiffs as such, did not specify the specific rule or regulation based on which, defendants could not have sold the suit property in question to third party. They did not specify the specific law based on which plaintiffs had the specific ownership rights over suit property in question. Since, plaintiffs sought the equitable rights from the Court so they should have shown the eq uity also. They did not do so.
19. Evidence of PW1 and PW2 as such failed to remove legal and aforesaid shortcomings in the case of plaintiffs. Therefore, their evidence was rightly discarded by Ld. Trial Court.
20. Lastly, for coming to the conclusion, I must mention here that since plaintiffs failed to prove their legal right over suit property in question, so, de fendants had right to sell off the suit property in question. It means that Sh.
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 8 / 9Vijender Kumar to whom defendants had allegedly sold the suit property in question as mentioned in the orders sheets dated 06.02.2014 and 10.03.2014 was not the necessary party. Sh. Vijender Kumar would have been necessary party in case, plaintiffs had proved their legal right over suit property in ques tion. Since, they failed to prove their legal right over suit property, so, selling of suit property by defendants, was not illegal. Defendants had the right to do so.
21. So, after the death of Sh. Kanhiya Lal, who had died intestate, plaintiffs did not get any legal right of title over suit property in question. Therefore, they are not entitled to the reliefs claimed by them.
22. The net result is that, Ld. Trial Court had passed correct judgement and decree dated 04.03.2015. Same cannot be interfered with. Accordingly, appeal stands dismissed. No order as to cost. DecreeSheet be prepared, ac cordingly. Trial Court Record be sent alongwith copy of this judgement.
Announced in the open Court [PRASHANT SHARMA]
Dated : 15th October, 2020 ADJ05, WEST DISTRICT
TIS HAZARI COURT, DELHI
Maya Devi Vs. Ravi Prakash Page No. 9 / 9