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ordinary ancestral property the power of alienation by the 



managing member is restricted only to his fractional share 

 of the property, there is no such limit in the case of an im- 

 partible Zemindari ; and consequently the dismemberment of 

 impartible estates is likely to be brought about more quickly 

 than the dismemberment of properties to which the ordinary 

 rule of inheritance applies. This result could not have been 

 contemplated, whatever theory is adopted in regard to the 

 origin of the rule of primogeniture, i.e., whether the object 

 of the rule is taken to be the maintenance of the dignity and 

 influence of a certain official position, or the maintenance of 

 the dignity and influence of certain ancient families ; for to 

 secure the object in view, the estate must be inalienable from 

 the office in the one case, and from the family in the other. 

 The means adopted by the English landed aristocracy to 

 preserve the integrity of estates, viz., successive settlements 

 voluntarily made by the owner of the reversion of the estate 

 for the time being, as soon as he attains majority, are not 

 available to the Zemindars, as the Hindu Law does not per- 

 mit of the settlement of estates on ' unborn ' persons. In 

 fact, the ancient Hindu Law, as already observed, regarded 

 land as constituting ' an estate dedicated equally to the sup- 

 port of sacrifices to deceased members, as to the sustenance 

 of those living, and still to come into life ; ' and powers of 

 alienation are a modern development. It seems to me, there- 

 fore, desirable that with a view to prevent litigation and 

 dissipation of properties it should be declared by legislation, 

 after due enquiry by a commission, (1) which estates are 

 ancient Zemindaries subject to the rule of primogeniture 

 and of impartibility, and whether the rule attaches to the 

 estate or to the family which holds it at present; and (2) 

 that the powers of the holder of the estate for the time being 

 shall be those of the managing member of a Hindu 

 family governed by the ordinary law of succession as they 

 were understood to be before the recent Privy Council 

 decision. The modern Hindu Law seems to steer clear of 

 the evils of the strict entails of the English system as 

 well as of the restrictions on the powers of bequest of 

 self-acquired landed property imposed by the French Law on 

 the one hand, and on the other of unrestricted powers 

 of disposition of ancestral property in a purely agricul- 

 tural country where the vast majority of the population 

 has to subsist by the cultivation of land. The powers of 

 the managing member in family property to deal with it 

 for the purposes of its improvement are, under the Hindu 

 Law, unrestricted; but at the same time he is prevented 



