Kanhaiya Singh, J.

1. This is an appeal from the judgment and decree of the Subordinate Judge, Darbhanga, dated the 13th July, 1950, which reversed the judgment of the Additional Munsif, Madhubani, dated the 15th June, 1949, and dismissed the plaintiffs suit for declaration of title to and confirmation or, in the alternative, recovery of possession of 9 Kathas 21/2 dhurs of land comprised in survey plots 946 and 128 situate in village Balia. The following admitted pedigree will help in appreciating the facts of this case:--

JHAULI JHA

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__________________|___________________

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Grihman Gudar

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_______________|____________ ______________|___________________

| | | | | |

Uahlt Gena Ajab Jogdhar Dharnidhar Buchan

= Mt. Sumitra =Mt. Batahi | | = Mt. Thakni

| ____________________|__ | |

Amoldat | | | Pitambar Lakshmi

Ram Faujdar Pratap (deft. 15) (deft. 3)

Paramhansh Ram Dass, Guru of the Plaintiff, obtained a money decree against Jogdhar and others, and in execution of it in Execution Case 115 of 1930 attached and put to sale plot 946 measuring 6 Kathas 8 dhurs besides other lands and himself purchased the same on the 28th January, 1930, and obtained delivery of possession through Court on the 8th July, 1931. This auction sale did not satisfy the entire decree, and in a second execution for the unsatisfied amount of the decree in Execution Case 55 of 1932 the plaintiffs Guru purchased the other plot in suit, namely, plot 128, having an area of 4 Kathas 12 dhurs and obtained delivery of possession on the 15th October, 1932. He died in 1342 fasli and was succeeded by his Chela, the plaintiff.

2. It will appear from the above genealogy that the judgment-debtors were descendants of Gu-dar. In the money decree Pitambar, Mst. Batahi and Mst. Thakni were not made parties. Accordingly, after the delivery of possession of plot 940 on the 8th July, 1931, Pitambar (defendant 15) filed an application under Order XXI, Rule 100, Civil Procedure Code, which was registered as Miscellaneous Case 167 of 1931. This application was allowed, and his one-sixth share in plot 946 was released. This share comes to about 1 Katha 1 1/3 dhurs, and accordingly the plaintiff has claimed only 5 Kathas 6 3/4 dhurs out of this plot.

Mst. Batahi, widow of Gena, and Pitamber instituted Title Suit 66 of 1937 against the plaintiff, the former for the release of her one-fourth share in both the plots and the latter for the release of his one-sixth share in plot 128. Similarly, Mst. Sumitra, widow of Uchit, instituted Title Suit 67 of 1937 for the release of her one-fourth share in the two disputed plots. Both these title suits were tried together and were dismissed. In appeal, however, the claim of Pitambar was allowed; in other words, his one-sixth share in plot 128 also was released from attachment and sale. Accordingly, the plaintiff has claimed only 3 kathas 15 3/4 dhurs out of plot 128.

3. The plaintiff asserted that he had acquired good title to the disputed land by virtue of the auction sale and was in peaceful and continuous possession until June, 1942, when defendants 1 and 6 for the first time interfered with his possession and forcibly and without right plucked mangoes from the orchard which stood in plot 128. The plaintiff instituted against them a criminal case, There was a counter-case against the plaintiff. Both the cases ended in acquittal of the accused. Thereupon, the plaintiff instituted the present suit for the reliefs indicated above.

4. The suit was contested by defendants 1, 6, 8 and 14. Their defence was common. They denied both the title and possession of the plaintiff and pleaded limitation. They alleged that the deli- very of possession was a mere paper transaction, and the plaintiff never entered into possession by virtue of Court Dakhaldehani. The case of defendant 1 was that his grand-father Chhotku purchased plot 946 and half of the plot 128 from Gudar Jha, ancestor of the defendants second party, by virtue of an unregistered deed of sale on the 30th Asarh, 1309 Fasli (1902) and that he was in possession continuously since after this purchase. Defendant 6, on the other hand, claimed the remaining half of plot 128, that is, 2 Khathas 6 dhurs, by virtue of purchase from Thakan Jha, who in his turn had purchased from Mt. Jageshwari, the mother and guardian of her minor son Bauku Rai.

Jageshwari is the sister of Sibu. Sibu, Anand and Deban had purchased 2 Kathas 6 dhurs out of plot 128 from Uchit, one of the sons of Grihman and Mt. Batahi, widow of Gena, the full-brother of Uchit, in 1928, On the death of Sibu and his two brothers one after another, their sister Jageshwar; and her sons inherited the property, and therefore she conveyed a good title to Thakan Jha. In this way, defendants 1 and 6 claimed title and possession. The plaintiff challenged these purchases as collusive and fraudulent and denied that the defendants had either title or possession of the suit lands.

5. The learned Munsif found that the plaintiff had title and possession of plot 946. He held that the Kebala set up by defendant L was fraudulent and collusive and defendant 1 was never in possession of this plot. As to the claim of defendant 6, he held that his kebala was genuine. In other words he upheld his title to the extent of half of plot 128. In short, his finding was that the plaintiff had title to 5 Kathas 6 3/4th dhurs out of plot 946 (the remaining portion belonging to Pitambar) and 1 Katha 10 2/3rd dhurs out of the Southern half of plot 128, the balance being one-sixth share of Pitambar. The plaintiff had no title to the northern half of plot 128, which belonged to defendant 6. He accordingly gave the plaintiff a modified decree,

6. Defendants 1 and 6 preferred an appeal to the District Judge, the appeal of defendant 6 being confined to only the costs awarded against him, since his title had been upheld by the learned Munsif. There was also a cross-appeal by the plaintiff with respect to the decree in favour of defendant 6.

7. In appeal, the learned Subordinate Judge dismissed the cross-appeal filed by the plaintiff and held that defendant 6 had in fact proved his title to 2 Kathas 6 dhuis out of plot 128 and his continuous possession thereof. As regards plot 946 he held that the plaintiff had title to this plot and that defendant 1 had no title. On the question of possession, however, he found that the delivery of possession in favour of the plaintiff did not operate to give him actual physical possession of the disputed land by dispossessing the judgment-debtors or their transferees in 1931 or 1932, that the plaintiff was never in possession of the disputed plot prior to the suit and that the defendants were in continuous possession of this land for upwards of twelve years prior to the institution of the suit. On these findings he held that the plaintiffs suit was burred by time. In the result, he allowed the appeal, set aside the decree of the learned Munsif and dismissed the suit with costs throughout.

8. The Plaintiff has come up in Second Appeal.

Mr. G. C. Mukharji appearing for the appellant did not press the claims so far as plot 128 is concerned. He confined his argument only with respect to plot 946. It will appear from the above that prima facie this appeal is concluded by findings of fact, namely, the plaintiff was never in possession of the disputed land within twelve years of the suit, and, therefore, the suit was liable to dismissal. Mr. Mukharji has, however, argued that while deposing on the 30th June, 1938, in Title Suits 66 and 67, both of 1937, defendant 1 admitted that the plaintiff was in possession of the disputed land and that this admission of his possession amounted to an acknowledgment by him of liability in respect of the disputed property within section 19 of the Limitation Act and, therefore, under that section a fresh period of limitation had to be computed from the 30th June 1938, with the result that the present suit having been instituted within twelve years of that acknowledgment on the 25th July, 1947, was not barred by limitation whether Article 144 or Article 142 applied. The statement of defendant 1 in his deposition on which great reliance was placed by him is as follows :

"At present defendant is in possession of the entire block."

The defendant in that suit is the present plaintiff. Mr. Mukharji contended that this statement amounted to admission by defendant 1 of the plaintiffs possession of the suit land in June, 1938, and, therefore, the period of limitation was extended by a valid acknowledgment of liability, within the meaning of Section 19. A similar argument was advanced before the Court of appeal below, and the argument was repelled on the ground that the statement was too vague to be acted upon, and the deposition taken as a whole did not indicate that this statement related to the disputed land.

Defendant 1 (D.W. 12) was examined in this suit, and he explained his aforesaid statement by saying that he had no knowledge that the title suit of 1937 related to disputed land. This explanation was accepted by the learned Subordinate Judge as correct. In my opinion, he was right, and the contention of Mr. Mukharji has no foundation in fact. Sub-section (1) of Section 19 of the Limitation Act provides : "Where, before the expiration of the period prescribed for a suit or application in respect of any property or right, an acknowledgment of liability in respect of such property or right has been made in writing signed by the party against whom such property or right is claimed, or by some person through whom he derives title or liability, a fresh period of limitation shall be computed from the time when the acknowledgement was so signed".

9. The alleged acknowledgment was made before the statutory period had run out. Thus, one requisite of Section 19 is complied with. It is contained in a deposition given by defendant 1 in Court which is signed by him. The necessity of signature by the party to be charged is also complied with. It is true that the acknowledgment is not addressed to the person entitled, but according to the Explanation given in Section 9, this is not necessary. There is, however, another important ingredient of this section. The acknowledgment under this section must be an acknowledgment in respect of the particular property or right claimed in the suit or application.

The words "an acknowledgment of liability in respect of such property or right has been made in writing" used in the section are sufficient to show that the document which contains the admission of liability must on its terms indicate clearly and unequivocally that such admission is in respect of the right sued on. In order to take the case out of the statute of limitation tise acknowledgment must be clear and precise. Vague and ambiguous words susceptible of different meanings are not sufficient to attract the provisions of this section. See Hingu Miya v. Heramba Chandra 8 Ind Cas 81 [LQ/CalHC/1910/493] (Cal), and Ramdin Singh v. Ram Parichan Singh : AIR 1942 Pat 170.

By virtue of Explanation 1 to the section it is not the requirement of a valid acknowledgment that the exact nature of the property or right should be specified. Nonetheless, the property or right in respect of which the admission of liability is made must be sufficiently deduciblc from the document relied upon. Whether or not the admission of liability relates to the property or right in suit depends upon the construction of documents containing such acknowledgment. The cardinal principle of the construction of a document is that the meaning sought to be put upon it must be ascertainable from the language used in it, and the surrounding circumstances should not be considered unless the meaning be doubtful.

Extrinsic evidence is always admissible, not to contradict or vary a written contract, but to apply it to the facts which the parties had in their minds and were negotiating about. See Lampson v. City of Quebec AIR 1920 PC 103 and Vatsavaya Venkata Subhadrayyamma v. Poosapati Venkatapati : AIR 1924 PC 162 [LQ/PC/1924/32] . Therefore, external evidence may be taken for the purpose of identifying the right indicated in the document in question. Considered in the light of these principles which are well settled, we have, therefore, the bare question of whether the alleged acknowledgment of liability was in respect of the suit property.

The statement in his deposition referred to above considered alone or in the light of the evidence on the record is not sufficiently precise to constitute an acknowedgmcnt of liability in respect of the right in controversy within the meaning of Section 19 of the Limitation Act. There is nothing to suggest that this statement refers to the disputed property. No attempt has been made to show by evidence aliunde that the words "entire block" used in that statement refer to the block which contained the property involved in the present litigation. Mr. Mukharji failed to satisfy us how the statement has reference to the suit property, namely, plots 946 and 128.

These plots are not specifically mentioned in the deposition. Apart from this, the defendant has himself given explanation and has said that while deposing in that suit he had no idea that these very plots were the subject-matter of that suit. There is nothing to falsify this explanation. In fact, this explanation was accepted as correct by the learned Subordinate Judge, and I do not think I shall be justified on the evidence, to take a view different from the one taken by him on a careful perusal of the deposition and the other evidence and my considered opinion is that there was on 30-6-1938, no sufficient and conscious acknowledgment of the plaintiffs right by defendant 1 to give a new period of limitation from the date of acknowledgment, and, therefore, the statement relied upon is not sufficient by the Indian law to take the case out of the statute. If there was no valid acknowledgment as envisaged in Section 19 of the Limitation Act, and there was none as shown above, the suit was, as rightly held by the learned Subordinate Judge, barred by time. The suit was, therefore, rightly dismissed by him.

10. Mr. B. C. De appearing for the respondents raised a preliminary objection that the entire appeal was incompetent and must be dismissed; as! it had already been dismissed against minor respondents 5 to 9. The reply of Mr. Mukharji is that those minor respondents were the sons of Jagdhar Jha, one of the defendants second party and that as no relief was claimed against them, the appeal was not incompetent and could proceed against the defendants first party, who are the real contestants. Since, however, the entire appeal fails on merits, it is not necessary to express any concluded opinion on this preliminary objection.

11. In the result, the appeal is dismissed with costs.

V. Ramaswami, C.J.

12. I agree.