Savitri Bai and another vs. Savitri Bai
Background
Both the plaintiff and the main defendant in this decades-old property dispute happened to share the name "Savitri Bai." The plaintiff claimed she had purchased a house in Katni, Madhya Pradesh, in 1979 through a registered sale deed from the second wife and children of the late Babulal Kahar, and that the defendant (Babulal's daughter from his first wife) had illegally taken forcible possession of it. The defendant countered that her father had, before the sale deed was executed, made a Will in 1977 bequeathing the property to her son, Meghraj. The Trial Court and the First Appellate Court both dismissed the plaintiff's suit, but the Madhya Pradesh High Court reversed this in second appeal, decreeing possession in the plaintiff's favour and declaring the Will null and void.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court allowed the appeal, set aside the High Court's judgment, and restored the findings of the Trial Court and First Appellate Court. It held that the Will had been duly proved through independent evidence, the testimony of the advocate who scribed it and the attesting witnesses, satisfying the requirements of Section 68 of the Evidence Act, 1872 and Section 63 of the Indian Succession Act, 1925, and that the High Court had wrongly brushed this evidence aside. Since the Will validly vested the property in Meghraj, and he was neither a party to the later sale deed nor represented in it through his guardian, that sale deed could not pass title to his share of the property, regardless of his mother's signature on it in her individual capacity.
Lesson Learnt
A Will that is properly proved through its scribe and attesting witnesses, in compliance with the Evidence Act and Succession Act, takes precedence over a later sale deed executed by someone who no longer owns the property; a signature on a sale deed by a person in her individual capacity cannot transfer property that actually belongs to her child unless she signs as that child's lawful guardian.