BEJLA ORAON
Vs.
KALI DAS ORAON AND OTHERS
( Before : Sanjay Karol and Nongmeikapam Kotiswar Singh, JJ. )
Civil Appeal No. ….of 2026 (Arising out of SLP (C.) No. 23458 of 2024)
Decided on : 09-07-2026
A. Hindu Law — Customary Law (Tribal) — Oraon Custom — Ghardamad (custom of adopted son-in-law) — Who may effect such adoption — Suit for declaration of title to ancestral land, contested on plea that a collateral (Punai) had been taken as ghardamad by plaintiff's grand-uncle Ledura, who died issueless, and thereby acquired inheritable rights transmissible to his wife Budhain — Concurrent findings of courts below upholding the ghardamad plea and dismissing the suit — Held, on a plain reading of the very authority (S.C. Roy, The Oraons of Chotanagpur) relied on by the courts below, a ghardamad can be adopted only by the last male owner himself or, after his death, by his widow — Adoption by an uncle-in-law (as opposed to the father-in-law or his widow) of his niece's husband falls outside the recognised custom and was not shown to be permissible by any evidence — Custom pleaded, being an exception to the ordinary line of succession, must be strictly proved by the party asserting it; concurrent findings resting on a misreading of the very treatise relied upon are not immune from interference under Article 136 — (Paras 11 to 13)
B. Evidence Act, 1872 — Section 48 — Proof of custom — Essential attributes and standard of proof — Custom must be ancient, certain, reasonable, and continuous, and proved by clear and cogent evidence of long and uniform usage, ordinarily through testimony of persons familiar with its practice — Onus lies on the party asserting the custom — A custom cannot be held established on the solitary, unsupported testimony of one witness, particularly where such testimony is confined to the facts of the case rather than a general and consistent practice — Held, on facts, while the custom of a ghardamad acquiring rights in his father-in-law's property stood proved, the specific claim that an uncle-in-law could similarly adopt a ghardamad was not established, being unsupported by consistent evidence — (Paras 5, 6 and 10.3 to 10.4)
C. Constitution of India — Article 136 — Interference with concurrent findings of fact — Scope — Concurrent findings of courts below ordinarily not disturbed in exercise of jurisdiction under Article 136 save in exceptional circumstances, such as where the finding is not based on evidence, is perverse, rests on inadmissible or extraneous material, ignores vital evidence, runs contrary to law, or occasions grave injustice — Held, where the trial court's finding on custom was itself founded on a misapplication of the very source-text cited by it, and the High Court, despite formulating a specific substantial question on the point, declined to answer it merely on account of the concurrence of findings below, interference was warranted — (Paras 8 to 8.4, 11 and 12)
D. Civil Procedure Code, 1908 (CPC) — Section 100 — Second appeal — Duty to decide substantial question of law once framed — Held, once a substantial question of law is formulated in second appeal, the High Court is obliged to hear parties and answer it on merits; declining to do so solely because the findings below are concurrent, without independent reasoning, is not a valid disposal under Section 100 — (Paras 4 and 11 to 12)
