Rajender Singh & Ors vs Santa Singh & Ors 1974 SCR (1) 381 | LAW OF LIMITATION

INTRODUCTION & FACTS

The Ps (A), filed an appeal in a suit for possession of land against the Ds The plaintiffs were the sons of Smt. Premi, a daughter of Sham Singh (Deceased), the original owner of the plots, and of Smt. Malan, who was the widow of Sham Singh, had gifted the plots in dispute in 1935, half and half, to the plaintiffs and Smt. Khemi, the younger sister of their deceased mother, Smt. Premi.

 It appears that Smt. Khemi, who was issueless, had also made a gift in favour of the Plaintiffs before her death in 1944. The plaintiffs are, said to have obtained possession of the whole land in dispute thus gifted to them.' But, as there was considerable uncertainty at that time about the rights of the daughters and the powers of a widow to donate during her life time under the customary law in Punjab, which was applicable to the parties.

Ds filed suit for possession of the land in dispute in 1940. 

There was also a dispute over mutation of names between the Ps and Ds in revenue courts which ended finally by judgment and decree of a Division Bench of the Punjab High Court passed in favour of the appellants on 21-11-1958.

The plaintiffs asserted, in their suit filed on 16-4-1959, now before SC that the Ds had taken illegal and forcible possession of the land in dispute after the decision of the High Court on 21-11-1958, and that, as the DS refused to deliver possession of the land to the plaintiffs, they were compelled to file their suit for possession. The Ds, however, claimed that they had taken possession over the whole of the land in dispute after the death of Smt. Khemi, issueless, in 1944, and that, since then, they had been in open, continuous, exclusive possession as owners, adversely to the rest of the world. Hence, according to the defendants-respondents, the plaintiffs' suit was barred by limitation.

Decision

Findings of fact recorded by the Courts below, the adverse possession of the defendants, who were appellants before the High Court, commenced during the pendency of the earlier suit, and, once having begun to run, could not stop running merely because of the pendency of the defendants' suit for possession which was finally dismissed by the High Court on 21-11-1958. On the other hand the doctrine of lis pendens, contained in Section 52 of the Transfer of Property Act, would enable the plantiffs-appellants to overcome the consequences of defendants' adverse possession until 21-11-1958 so that the doctrine of lis pendens could operate as a provision enabling exclusion of time during the pendency of the defendants' suit of 1940.

Appeal dismissed by the Supreme Court of India.

Interpretation by the court

In this case the Supreme Court of India has held “The object of the law of limitation is to prevent disturbance or deprivation of what may have been acquired in equity and justice by long enjoyment or what may have been lost by a party’s own inaction, negligence or latches.”