(1) Order of reference to a full bench dellvered by the hon'ble the chief justice : this is an appeal against the judgment of our learned brother umamaheswaram j. Holding that a widew, after her surrender of the properties to the next reversioners is entitled to file a suit for enhancement of the rate of maintenance given to her under the surrender deed. In support of his view, the learned judge mainly relied upon the observations of sadasiva ayyar j. In chinnaswami pillai v. Appalaswami pillai '. After hearing the arguments advanced by the learned counsel, we think the question raised should be authoritatively decided by a full bench. We therefore refer the following question for the decision of the full bench : "whether a widow after surrendering her widow's estate in favour of the next reversioners, is entitled to be maintained out of the estate in the hands of the surrenderee?" opinion opinion of the full bench was delivered by viswanatha sastry, j. The question referred to the full bench is " whether a widow after surrendering her widow's estate in favour of the next reversioners, is entitled to be maintained out of the estate in the hands of the surrenderee". In the case out of which the reference has arisen there was a surrender by a hindu widow of the estate inherited by her from her husband in favour of the nearest male reversioners with a stipulation for the payment to her by the reversioners of a sum of rs. 50/ - per year for her maintenance in the event of her desiring to live separate from them. After receiving maintenance at the above rate for some years the widow sued the reversioners for enhanced maintenance out of her husband's estate on account of the increased cost of living but the reversioners denied her right to such maintenance. The reference covers not only cases where a hindu widow surrenders her husband's estate without any stipulation for her maintenance and subsequently claims maintenance from that estate in the hands of the reversioner but also cases where she seeks a revision of the terms of a maintenance arrangement entered into with the reversioner when she surrendered the estate. We are not aware of any decision and none has been cited to us, where this particular point has been considered. There is a very large body of authority in decided cases which touches it but it is not concluded or even covered by any decision. The answer to the question referred must rest on a consideration of the true nature and effect of a surrender of a widow's estate under the hindu law. The doctrine of surrender for which textual authority is slender has been established by judicial decisions ranging over a century starting from the decision of the supreme court of bengal in jadoomoney debee v, mookerjee ' and ending with the decision of the supreme court of india in natvarlal v. Dadhubhai. And a full bench of this court in rami reddi v. Rosarnma '. The writers of the bengal school first foreshadowed the theory of relinquishment or surrender by a hindu widow and the early decisions of the calcutta high court formulated the doctrine with its limitations and qualifications. In dealing with the question of succession after the widow's death, jimutavahana and acharya chudamani indicated the possibility of her right ceasing before her death and in that event prescribed the same line of devolution of the estate as on her death. From these passages was evolved the theory of ''surrender" or acceleration of the estate of the next heir by the withdrawal of the widow's interest in property inherited by her from her husband. It was held by the courts that the reversioners would take the estate, not merely when the widow died but also when her title was otherwise extinguished, for instance, by renunciation or surrender or by remarriage. Referring to the acceleration of the reversioners right by surrender, sir james golvile g. J. Of the supreme court of bengal observed in jadomoney debee v. Sarodo prosonno mookerjee: "it is, in fact but another way of doing that which in former times was continually done without violence to the letter or spirit of hindu law, though in a manner shocking to humanity, by means of the rite of suttee. " pursuing the same train of thought lord dunedin in rangaswami goundan v, nachiappa goundan -. Observed; "a hindu widow can renounce in favour of the nearest reversioner. That is to say, she can, so to speak by voluntary act operate her own death. As already pointed out it is the effacement of the widow - - an effacement which in other circumstances is effected by actual death or civil death - which opens the estate of the deceased husband to his next heirs at that date. In a later case sitanna v. Viranna' the judicial committee again pointed out that the basis of the doctrine of surrender was "the effacement of the widow's interest" and its effect was merely that the next heir of the husband stepped into the succession in the widow's place. In two recent decisions of the supreme court in nagireddy v. Durairaja naidu ' and natvarlal v. Dadhubhai'' the fundamental basis of the doctrine of surrender was expounded by mukherji, j. Who delivered the judgment of the supreme court. The learned judge observed in the latter case : "the widow's estate is an interposed limitation or obstruction which prevents or impe des the course of succession in favour of the heirs of her husband. It is open to the widow by a voluntary act of her own to remove this obstruction and efface herself from the husband's estate altogether. If she does that the consequence is the same as if she had died a natural death and the next heirs of her husband then living step in at once under the ordinary law of inheritance. " as the basis of the doctrine of the widow's surrender is the "effacement" of the widow an effacement which in other circumstances is effected by actual or civil death - whieh opens the estate of her deceased husband to his next heirs at that date, it follows as a necessary corollary that the surrender must be of the entire estate. As observed by the judicial committee in rangaswami goundan v. Nachiappa goundan there cannot be a widow who is partly effaced and partly not so. " in law therefore, there can be no partial surrender or a surrender of part only of the properties or of the inerest of the widow in the properties inherited by her from her husband. The surrender to be valid must be of the whole of the widow's interest in the whole estate. In other words, it must be a bona fide surrender by the widow to the reversioner and not a device, directly or indirectly through a nominee to divide the estate with the reversioner. There must be a complete self - effacement or total renunciation or abandonment or relinquishment or surrender of the widow's right to hold her husband's estate, whatever be the name and form of the transaction. See bhagwat koer v. Dhanukhadari prasad ; sureshwar misser v. Mahesri misrain. The authorities on this point were recently reviewed in rami reddi v. Rosamma. There is one other feature of the doctrine of surrender which has a bearing on the question now before us. Ordinarily a mere disclaimer by an heir will have no effect and inherited property will have to be transferred by a conveyance if the title to it is to vest in another person. The hindu law lays down a different rule in the case of a surrender by a hindu widow. The surrender by a widow conveys nothing in law. It is merely the self - effacement of the widow having the same consequences as her death. It extinguishes her title but does not transfer or convey it. In natavarlal v. Dadhubhai approving of damaraju v, narayana the supreme court said :

"thus surrender is not really an act of alienation of the widow of her rights in favour of the reversioner. The reversioner does not occupy the position of a grantee or transferee, and does not derive his title from her. He derives his title from the last male holder, as has successor - in - law and the rights of succession are opened out by the act of self - effacetnent on the part of the widow which operates in the same manner as her physical death. It is true that a surrender may, and in the majority of cases does, take the form of a transfer. But it is the self - effacement by the widow that forms the basis of the surrender and not the ex facie transfer by which such effacement is brought about."

See also sitanna v. Veeranna. It is therefore clear that on a surrender by the widow, the reversioner takes the estate in his own right as the heir of the last male owner and not as a transferee or grantee from the widow or as a person claiming under her. The argument for the reversioner is simple enough. A surrender is a voluntary act of the widow and she is under no legal or moral obligation to surrender her estate. The effect of a surrender is to extinguish the title of the widow to her husband's estate. The surrender once exercised, the estate vests in the nearest reversioner or reversioners as owner. The self - effacement by the widow, like her death, precludes her from asserting any further claim to the estate. Bhagwat koer v. Dhanukdhari prasad singh ''. She cannot make a claim for maintenance from the estate which has ceased to be hers or her husband's and has vested in the next heir, by virtue of the surrender. If after a surrender the widow is to be held entitled to maintenance of any specific amount or to any specific part of her husband's property by way of maintenance, it would not be a total surrender of her entire interest in her husband's estate and free from the vice of sharing the estate with the reversioner. It is inconsistent with the doctrine that the surrender must be total and would amount to a device to divide the estate. It would be an alienation for consideration and not an acceleration of the succession. The argument for the widow who surrenders the estate and claims maintenance from it might run on the following lines: a widow who surrenders her whole estate is not civilly dead except for the purpose of letting in the next reversioner as heir to her husband's estate. Though she is treated as if she were civilly dead quoad the estate of her husband, she is in fact physically alive and must have something to live upon. Even after a surrender by the widow to the nearest reversioner, she will be entitled to maintenance on the general principle of hindu law that a person inheriting property is liable to maintain those whom the late proprietor was bound to maintain. The obligation of all persons who take her husband's estate to maintain the widow is an absolute obligation imposed by the hindu law and cannot be destroyed by her surrender thereof. Per sadasiva iyer", j. In chinnaswami pillai v. Appaswami pillai , per seshagiri iyer, j. In angamuthu v. Varatharajulu chetty", per beaumont c. J. In gangadhar v. Prabudha. Therefore her right to maintenance is neither lost nor affected by a surrender and could be asserted as long as she is alive. It is now firmly established that a reasonable provision for the maintenance of a hindu widow does not invalidate a surrender by her of her husband's estate to the nearest reversioner, provided it is a bonafide surrender of the entire interest of the widow in the whole estate and not a mere device to divide the estate with the reversioner. Angamuthu chetti v. Varatharajulu chetti - bhagwat koer v. Dhanukdhariprasad singh ; sureshwar misser v. Mahe shrani misrain; radharani v. Brindarani; sitanna v. Viranna. A reasonable provision for the maintenance of the surrendering widow might be made by setting apart a portion of the estate for that purpose or by a personal agreement to maintain her or to pay her a specific amount. There may be cases where it would be difficult to draw the line between a maintenance arrangement and an arrangement to divide the estate between the widow and the reversioner. The sanction accorded by courts to provisions for the maintenance of the widow must be regarded as somewhat anomalous and inconsistent with the theory of a surrender with its requirement of a complete effacement of the widow. If the provision for maintenance is regarded as the consideration for the surrender, the transaction is in effect an alienation or transfer for consideration and not a surrender which as already pointed out conveys nothing but merely extinguishes the widow's title and opens up the succession to the next heirs of the male owner. The assumption in some of the cases cited that a widow after surrender remains entitled to maintenance and the rever. Sioner takes the estate subject to the obligation of her maintenance does not rest on any text of hindu law and is opposed to principle. It is obvious that the hindu law allows maintenance to widows only "because of their exclusion from inheritance and from a share on partition. " vellaiyappa v. Natarajan. Even where, as in upper india the widow is allotted a share on partition she takes it in lieu of maintenance. Hemangini v. Kedar nath. Where a widow inherits her husband's estate as his heir at law "her right is of the nature of a right of property; her position is that of owner, her powers in that character are, however, limited". Janaki ammal v. Naryanaswami iyer. Within the limits imposed upon her, she has absolute power of enjoyment and is accountable to none. Where a widow succeeds as heir to her husband's estate, there is no question of her having a right of maintenance against herself or from the estate of which she is the owner. If the widow transfers property inherited by her from her husband or loses title to it by adverse possession, neither the transferee nor the person who acquires a prescriptive title would be liable for her maintenance. If a widow disclaims title to property which the law of succession vests in her as her husband's heir or if she relinquishes it later on she deliberately abandons her right thereto and cannot thereafter assert any further claim to the estate either as owner or as a person entitled to a benefit out of it by way of maintenance. A surrender, once validly made, is irrevocable and the law carries the estate to the next heir who was under no obligation to maintain the widow. Quoad her husband's estate the widow is treated as though she were civilly dead once she makes a surrender. After such surrender the widow cannot resort to the fiction of a revival of a right of maintenance which she had not before. A widow may surrender her husdand's estate either because she has sufficient stridhanam property or because she is earning a separate income or because she wants to favour the existing next reversioner to the detriment of the more remote who might have a chance of being the nearest when the reversion falls in. There is no justification for the assumption that she impliedly reserves a right of maintenance when she makes a surrender or for the legal fiction that a right of maintenance automatically springs up on a surrender by her of her husband's estate. Looked at from the point of view of the reversioner who takes the estate, he would not have been subject to the obligation of maintaining the widow if the property had devolved upon him by inheritance in the usual course. The surrender brings about the same result by operation of law. Though the judicial committee insisted in rangaswami goundan v. Nachiappa goundan. And sureshwar misser v. Mahesrani misrain that a surrender must be bona fide in the sense that the widow retains no benefit either directly or indirectly and that there must be a relinquishment of the entire interest of the widow in the whole of her husband's estate, still decisions of the judicial committee and the several high courts have held that a resaonable provision by way of maintenance reserved to the widow at or about the time of surrender, does not affect the validity of the surrender, if in other respects, it is unobjectionable. See mayne's hindu law (11th edition) page 788 and the numerous cases cited in footnote (v). There is such a consensus of decision in the cases with the exception of adivappa v. Tontappa that one is fairly entitled to come to the conclusion that custom has sanctioned such arrangements in so far as they provide a reasonable maintenance for the widow surrendering the estate. It is part of the custom that one sine qua non of such an arrangement should be the consent or agrement of the reversioner who succeeds to the estate on such surrender to provide maintenance for the widow. There has been some looseness in the discussions as to the legal basis of such an arrangement but if, as appears to be the case, the reservation of a right of maintenance in favour of the surrendering widow is a common term in surrenders and has been uniformly enforced, it is not necessary to explain or justify it with reference to any fiction of a revival of the right of maintenance which lay dorment so long as the widow was in possession of her husband's estate as his heir. It is sufficient to hold that custom sanctions such arrangements. In as much as such arrangements are against the strict and logical view of the nature and effect of a surrender, the custom has to be confined within the limits recognised by precedents. It would be unreasonable to hold that a reversioner in whom the estate vests as a result of the unilateral action of the widow in renouncing or relinquishing her interest therein, comes under an obligation to provide for her maintenance irrespective of his volition or against his wishes. It is not a case where the reversioner takes a transfer of property from the widow with a covenant to maintain her. He succeeds to the estate in his own right as the heir of the 1st male owner and not as a person claiming title under the widow. Nor is this a case where the widow is excluded by law from succession to her husband's estate in which case her maintenance would be a burden on the estate, whoever succeeds to it. For these reasons, the answer to the question referred must be that if there is an agreement between the widow who surrenders the estate of her deceased husband and the next reversioner who takes the estate on such surrender, that the widow should be provided maintenance out of the estate, either by the allotment of a specific part of the property or by payment of a specific sum or otherwise the widow would be entitled to maintenance in accordance with such agreement. She cannot get enhanced maintenance in excess of the agreed stipulation if the reversioner objects. If, however, the widow surrenders the estate in favour of the next reversioners without any stipulation for her maintenance, she is not thereafter entitled to be maintained out of the estate in the hands of the reversioners and the latter cannot be compelled to pay her maintenance. The judgment of the division bench was delivered by the hon'ble the chief justice : pursuant to the opinion given by the full bench the appeal is allowed with costs throughout, bhimasankaram j. I agree. T. A. B. Appeal allowed.