' MUHAMMAD BASHIR JEHANGIRI, J.---This petition for leave to appeal is directed against the judgment of the Lahore High Court, Multan Bench dated 1-10-1998 whereby Civil Revision No,421-D of 1996 filed by the petitioners against the appellate judgment dated 12-3-1996 of the learned Additional District Judge, Multan, was dismissed.
2. It arises out of suit instituted by the petitioners against their father Islam-ud-Din, respondent, in the Court of a learned Civil Judge, II Class, Multan, for declaration of their proprietary title over House No,3585/W-8-M, situate in Chowk Shaheedan, Railway Road, . Multan City. The plaintiffs/petitioners asserted in their plaint and later attempted to substantiate by oral evidence in the witness that the house was originally owned by their grandfather, Muhammad Siddique, who before proceeding for performing Haj, in 1971, had orally gifted the house to the petitioners in the presence of family members and other relatives, as his son, who is the father of the petitioners, was disobedient and insolent.
3. The respondent contested the suit by traversing vehemently the assertion that his father had gifted the house in favour of the petitioners or pursuant to the alleged gift had delivered its possession to the petitioners. The suit of the petitioners was dismissed by the learned trial Judge on the findings that the petitioners have utterly failed to prove the transaction of oral gift of the house by Muhammad Siddique, their grandfather in favour of the petitioners and that the suit was barred by time under Article 120 of the Limitation Act, 1908 having not been instituted within 6 years of the making of the gift in 1971. The learned trial Judge appraised the testimony of Mst. Anwari (P.W.1), that of her husband Shabbir Ahmad; and Sabir Ali one of the petitioners and reached the conclusion that although Mst. Anwari (P.W.1) was the real sister of the respondent but she being the wife of Shabbir Ahmad was unreliable as the latter's sister was the estranged wife of the respondent and the petitioners were the maternal nephews of Shabbir Ahmad P.W. The petitioners' evidence, thus, did not appear to the learned trial Judge to be confidence inspiring. Conversely, apart from the respondent, Mst. Sabri, real sister of the petitioners supported her father and insisted that her grandfather had never gifted the house to the petitioners and that her father had validly and genuinely inherited it from her grandfather. The trial Judge also found as a fact that in the Excise and Texation Record the house continued to be recorded as ownership of the respondent in whose name electricity charges bills were being dispatched and charges were being paid by the respondent. Similarly learned Additional District Judge, who was seized of the appeal, filed by the petitioners maintained the findings of the lower Court that the alleged oral gift transaction of the house in favour of the petitioners by Muhammad Siddique their grandfather was not established and that suit was barred by time. The Judge in Chambers of the High Court concurred with the finding of the two Courts below.
4. The learned counsel is seeking, leave to appeal had reiterated the contentions which had been repelled by the First Appellate Court and the learned High Court that the two Courts had not misread the ocular evidence of the witness, who appeared on either side but also misconstrued the documentary evidence in the shape of Excise and Taxation Record and electricity charges bill in the name of the respondent, 5, We have not been persuaded to agree with the learned counsel for the petitioners. The learned Courts have concurrently found that the oral gift of the house allegedly made by Muhammad Siddique in favour of the petitioners who are his grandsons was not established. We have ourselves perused the record and come to the same conclusion, We also do not find any substance in the submission that the two lower Courts have in any manner misread the evidence or misconstrued the documentary evidence. Indeed we are convinced that no gift at all was made by Muhammad Siddique deceased grandfather of the petitioners in favour of the petitioners.
6. In factual background of the particular case, we find no proper ground to interfere with the concurrent findings of fact that the so=called gift was far from proved: It was apparently an imaginative exercise undertaken and a futile attempt made by the petitioners to subdue their father in order to lend support to their mother who is sitting with them as an estranged wife of the respondent. The respondent who is son of Muhammad Siddique, the real owner of the house cannot be disinherited on the mere assertion of an oral gift.
7. The petition for leave to appeal is dismissed.