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Showing contexts for: oral assignment in Ram Gopal vs Nand Lal And Others on 14 November, 1950Matching Fragments
occurring in a deed of gift were held insufficient to cut down to life interest the estate taken by the donees. These words, it was said, "are quite capable of signifying that the gift was made for the purpose of enabling them to live in comfort and do not necessarily mean that it was to be limited to a bare right of maintenance."
On behalf of the respondent, reliance was placed upon the decision of the Judicial Committee in Raja Ram Buksh v. Arjun(1)in support of the contention that in a maintenance grant it is the prima facie intention of the gift that it should be for life. In my opinion, the decision cited is no authority for the general proposition as is contended for by the learned Counsel for the respondent, and it is to be read in the context of the actual facts of the case which relate to grants of a particular type with special features of its own. It was a case where a Talukdar made a grant of certain villages to a junior member of the joint family for mainte- nance of the latter. The family was governed by the law of primegeniture and the estate descended to a single heir. In such cases the usual custom is that the junior members of the family, who can get no share in the property, are enti- tled to provisions by way of maintenance for which assign- ments of lands are generally made in their favour. The extent of interest taken by the grantee in the assigned lands depends entirely upon the circumstances of the partic- ular case, or rather upon the usage that prevails in the particular family. In the case before the Privy Council there was actually no deed of transfer. It was an oral assignment made by the Talukdar, and the nature of the grant had to be determined upon the recitals of a petition for mutation of names made to the Revenue Department by the grantor after the verbal assignment was made and from other facts and circumstances of the case. The case of Woodoya- ditta Deb v. Mukoond(2), which was referred to and relied upon in the judgment of the Privy Council, was (1) 28 I.A,