Thiru.Karuppiah Devar / father of the appellant herein. Further, they concede that following his demise, the appellant was enjoying the suit property. They would however claim that the appellant received a sum of Rs.1400/- from them and orally sold the suit property in their favour in June 1977 in the presence of the panchayatdhars. Obviously, such a transaction cannot be countenanced. Any immovable property valued beyond Rs.100/- can be conveyed only through a registered instrument. Therefore, the courts below rightly negatived the claim of the oral sale put forth by the plaintiffs. However, the courts below came to the conclusion that the plaintiffs have perfected their title by adverse possession. However, it is too well settled that a person claiming adverse possession is obliged to establish the same. Though in the plaint, it has been averred that right from 1977, the plaintiffs have been in open and uninterrupted possession, the evidence does not measure up to the same. In any event, when the defendant had seriously questioned the plaintiff's title, the plaintiffs were obliged to amend the plaint and seek the relief of declaration. Ofcourse, even on the strength of adverse possession, the right of declaration can be sought. But in this case, the plaintiffs have failed to do so. Therefore, as held by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Anathula Sudhakar Vs. P.Buchi Reddy (dead) by LRs and others (2008) 4 SCC 594 , the suit was clearly not maintainable. The courts below failed to take note of this elementary aspect. Of-course, the appellant himself would concede that the plaintiffs are in possession of the suit property. According to the appellant, since for a while, he was away from India, he had permitted the plaintiffs to be in possession of the suit property. Since the appellant himself admitted that the plaintiffs are in possession of the suit property, the plaintiffs only can be given the relief of permanent injunction that they cannot be dispossessed except by due process of law. In this case, the courts below had also cast the entire burden on him to prove the adverse possession of the plaintiffs.
