1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION APPEAL FROM ORDER NO.256 OF 2009 WITH CIVIL APPLICATION NO.1409 OF 2009 IN APPEAL FROM ORDER NO.256 OF 2009 Ujwala Manohar Ethape & Anr. .... Appellants Vs. Gujarat Trading Company & Ors. .... Respondents Shri Vinod Desai for the Appellants. Shri R.A. Dada, Senior Counsel with Ms Samidha Vedpathak i/b Shri V.S. Talkute for Respondent Nos.1(a) to (f). CORAM: R.C. CHAVAN, J. DATED: JUNE 23, 2010 P.C: 1. This appeal is directed against the order passed by learned 2nd Joint Civil Judge, Senior Division, Satara rejecting the application Exhibit-5 in Special Civil Suit No. 127 of 2008. The learned counsel for the appellants argued the matter beyond the time which is normally permitted for hearing the appeals against orders for admission. From time 2 to time he was informed that he should complete his arguments within five minutes. Even after two spells of five minutes were taken, he is not satisfied and complains that still he has not been heard fully. It is unfortunate that the learned counsel should not be concerned about the time of the Court when several matters get shunted for want of time. Be that as it may. 2. The appellants, who are two destitutes, claim to have become owners by adverse possession of the entire suit property which is described in the plaint as plot bearing No.473, valued at Rs.1,50,00,000/- on which the appellants have paid Court fee of Rs. 1,93,230/-. Appellant No.1 claims that in the year 1990 she came alone to Panchgani, a hill station, and since she had no avocation, started working as a labourer. She claimed that in the second week of February, 1990, she started residing on the suit property. Appellant No.2, who too seems to have had matrimonial discord, joined appellant No.1 some time in January, 1994. According to the averments in the plaint, the appellants claim that they have perfected the title by adverse possession and therefore claim protection of 3 their possession over the entire property. 3. The appellants had filed Suits bearing Nos.291 of 2001 and 186 of 2002 before the learned Civil Judge, J.D., Wai. In Suit No.291 of 2001, appellant No.1 stated that she was a divorcee, who did not have any support, did not have any child, did not have any means of income except labour. Since she was in need of a job and since defendant No.1 therein i.e., Sheriyar Rashid Shanasa was in need of a servant, she joined his employment and on that day i.e., 14-12-1996 came into possession of a room and bathroom, etc., also situated on the same final plot No.473. 4. In Suit No.186 of 2002, again in respect of the property situated on the final plot No.473, appellant No.1 claimed that in March, 1993, under an oral agreement with Sheriyar Rashid Shanasa, she became tenant in respect of some part of the property. In this context, the appellants' claim to have become owners by adverse possession now in respect of the entire plot came to be examined by the learned trial Judge. The photographs on which the learned counsel for the appellants seeks to place reliance prove nothing. They cannot show 4 as to in what capacity and since when the appellants were in possession and in respect of which part of the property. 5. The learned counsel for the appellants himself drew my attention to certain letters filed on the record. The first letter dated 4-2-1998 is by the Member Secretary of Wai Taluka Legal Services Authority, addressed to Advocate Pramod Thithe for granting legal aid to appellant No.1. Thus, this would show some dispute arose in the year 1998. It is not known as to for what purpose the legal aid was granted. Even if it is presumed that it was in a dispute in respect of same property, this would put an end to the first appellant's claim of having become owner by adverse possession, since, even according to the first appellant's own story, her possession had begun in the year 1990 and if her possession was questioned in 1998, since she was given legal aid in 1998, it would imply that her possession was objected to and thus was not open and uninterrupted. 6. The appellants had next relied on the letters written to the Collector and District Supply Officer for ration card. These letters are of the year 2002 and thereafter there is 5 nothing to show that in the year 1996, these helpless women were not required to seek a ration card and had kept quiet all along, and awoke only after the litigation in respect of the property began. Therefore, it cannot be said that the learned trial Judge erred in coming to the conclusion that the appellants had not made out a prima facie case. 7. The learned counsel for the appellants, as is usual in cases of unscrupulous litigants who have no merits, sought to rely on a bunch of authorities saying that on the basis of those judgments, the appellants were entitled to protection. He particularly placed reliance on para 8 of the judgment of the Supreme Court in Rame Gowda (Dead) by LRs v. M. Varadappa Naidu (Dead) by LRs and another, reported in (2004) 1 SCC 769, wherein the Supreme Court has observed that the law will come to the aid of a person in peaceful and settled possession by injuncting even a rightful owner from using force or taking the law in his own hands, and also by restoring to him in possession even from the rightful owner. There can be no doubt that a person in a settled possession is entitled to protection from Courts. But here are the 6 plaintiffs who are extending their tentacles from time to time over the property and shifting stand from having been inducted on the property as servant, to the claim of having become tenants and then as trespassers who had perfected title by adverse possession. Thus the plaintiffs are making different claims at different times to suit their convenience in order to make up a claim for protection of possession by setting up a hostile title. The learned trial Judge, therefore, rightly held against the plaintiffs and refused injunction. 8. The appeal is, therefore, dismissed. (R.C. CHAVAN, J.)