JUDGMENT : 1. The plaintiffs are the sons of Mangli Kurmi by his wife Ruky who is defendant 4. Defendants 1, 2 and 3 are his sons by another wife. Mangli died in September 1911. In the course of the mutation proceedings consequent upon his death a petition was filed on 4th January 1912 setting out that the parties bad agreed that the names of defendants 1, 2 and 3 should be entered in respect of Mangli's zamindari property and that the names of the plaintiff's should be entered in respect of 3 bighas malikana, the plots being specified. The petition was signed on behalf of the plaintiffs by their mother, defendant 4. The plaintiffs were then and still are minors. Mutation of names was made in accordance with the petition as regards the zamindari. There is nothing to show what was done about the 3 bighas. In June 1912 the plaintiffs brought the present suit to set aside the compromise and for possession of their shares in the zamindari. The Munsif gave them a decree for 2/5ths of the property and his decree was confirmed on appeal by the Subordinate Judge who held that the petition of compromise was not admissible in evidence not having been registered, that the sanction of the revenue Court was necessary to the validity of the compromise but was not obtained, and that the plaintiffs' mother had no power to enter into the compromise on their behalf as it was not for their benefit. 2. Order 32, R. 7, does not apply to proceedings under Section 35 of the Land Revenue Act; therefore the compromise cannot be set aside merely on the ground that the revenue Court did not give the plaintiffs' mother as guardian leave to enter into it on their behalf. 3. The learned vakil for the defendants-appellants contended in the first place that documents evidencing a family settlement do not require registration, at all events where, as in the present case the compromise does not purport to transfer property from one party to another, but is based on the assumption that there was some kind of antecedent title in the parties and, the compromise acknowledges and defines what that title is, and reference was made to Khunni Lal v. Gobind Krishna Narain, [1911] 10 I.C. 477 : 33 All. 356 and Piarey Lal v. Kokla Kunwar, [1913] 18 I.C. 766 and on appeal Kokla v. Piarey Lal, [1913] 21 I.C. 29 : 35 All. 502. The former case Khunni Lal v. Gobind Krishna Narain, deals with the effect of a compromise on titles set up by disputants but it does not lay down that all compromises are based on the assumption that a party has some antecedent title to the property allotted to him. Some compromises certainly rest on no such assumption. It often happens that property is conveyed by one party to another in consideration of the abandonment of a claim by the other. I am not satisfied that the compromise in the present case was based on any such assumption and the decision of the Privy Council is certainly no authority for the proposition that documents giving effect to a family settlement are exempt from the registration law. In the case decided by this Court a petition not unlike the one now in question had, been filed in some mutation proceedings. Griffin, J., decided that it did not require registration because neither of the parties thereto purported to convey any property, and the petition simply contained a statement that they agreed that each should be recorded in respect of one half of the property. The appellate judgment is as follows; “In our opinion it must be presumed from the whole proceedings, commencing with the petition for mutation, the order of the revenue authorities recording the names in accordance with the petition and the subsequent sales upon the strength of this record that the parties entered into a family arrange. On these grounds we think that the decree of the learned Judge of this Court ought to stand.” Nothing was said about the question of registration. I am disposed to think that the real ground of the decision was that as sales had taken place on the strength of the record made with the consent of the plaintiffs, it was too late for the plaintiffs to go back on what had been done. Otherwise it is difficult to account for the fact that the Court did not refer to the case of Sadaruddin Ahmad v. Chajju, [1909] 1 I.C. 558 : 31 All. 13., in which both learned Judges had taken part, or to the case of Rustam Ali Khan v. Mt. Otherwise it is difficult to account for the fact that the Court did not refer to the case of Sadaruddin Ahmad v. Chajju, [1909] 1 I.C. 558 : 31 All. 13., in which both learned Judges had taken part, or to the case of Rustam Ali Khan v. Mt. Gaura, [1911] 12 I.C. 10 : 33 All. 728 which was precisely in point. 4. Written instruments are certainly not exempt from registration merely because they evidence or carry out a family settlement: see Pranal Anni v. Lakshmi Anni, [1899] 22 Mad. 508 (P.C.), and I know of no authority for the proposition that a document which would otherwise require registration need not be registered if it is thrown into the form of a petition or is presented to a Court along with a petition. In Bindeshri Naik v. Ganga Saran, [1898] 20 All. 171 : 25 I.A. 9 (P.C.), their Lordships of the Privy Council said that Section 17 of the Registration Act, did not apply to proper judicial proceedings, whether consisting of pleadings filed by the parties or of orders made by the Court. But that observation has never been understood to mean that the Registration Act does not apply at all to any document presented to a Court. In the Madras case Pranal Anni v. Lakshmi Anni cited above, a razinamah had been presented to a civil Court with a petition that a decree might be passed in accordance with it. The Privy Council held that in so far as it was submitted to and was acted upon judicially by the Court, it was a step of judicial procedure not requiring registration and the order pronounced in terms of it constituted res judicata, binding upon the parties who gave their consent to it. The razinamah set out the terms of an “agreement of union relating to other lands which had not been filed, but as the decree of the Court did not refer to those lands their Lordships held that, as regards them, the parties must be relegated to the agreement of union which not being registered was inoperative.” There has been a difference of opinion between this Court and the Calcutta High Court as to the precise meaning of this ruling of the Privy Council as regards a point which does not arise here: see Raghubans Mani Singh v. Mahabir Singh, [1905] 28 All. 78 and Gurdeo Singh v. Chandrikah Singh [1909] 1 I.C. 913 : 36 Cal. 193, but both Courts have decided that a petition of compromise presented to a Court which declares the respective interests of the parties in property exceeding Rs. 100 in value, must be registered before it can be used as evidence of title, unless it is acted upon judicially by the Court: see Kashi Kunbi v. Sumer Kunbi, [1910] 5 I.C. 234 : 32 All. 206 and Rustam Ali Khan v. Mt. Gaura (5). 5. In the present case the petition of compromise was acted upon by the revenue Court, at all events as regards the zamindari interests of Mangli, but no decision of a revenue Court in a mutation proceeding can render a question of title res judicata. The Privy Council were referring to the decree of a civil Court when they said that the order pronounced upon the razinamah constituted res judicata and, in my opinion, Knox and Piggott, JJ., were right in deciding in Rustam Ali Khan v. Mt. Gaura that an order of a revenue Court upon a petition of compromise is mutation proceedings could have no such effect. 6. There remains another point which was strongly pressed by Dr. Surendranath Sen. He contended that the law did not require a compromise of the kind now in question to be in writing, and that the proper view to take of the case was that the parties settled the terms of the compromise before they signed the petition and that the petition was not intended to carry out the compromise but only to inform the Court of it. He also relied upon the judgment of Banerji, J., and myself in Abu Safian v. Aminullah, Second Appeal No. 565 of 1913.. In that case it was alleged that two ladies had renounced their shares in the property of a deceased person in 1903. All that we held was that an unregistered petition of 1904 might be used as evidence of the relinquishment said to have taken place in 1903. 7. When the terms of a compromise are found to be set out is a document, it cannot be lightly assumed that the compromise was complete before the document was signed. All that we held was that an unregistered petition of 1904 might be used as evidence of the relinquishment said to have taken place in 1903. 7. When the terms of a compromise are found to be set out is a document, it cannot be lightly assumed that the compromise was complete before the document was signed. In most cases the signing of the document by both parties is intended to indicate that pourparlers have come to an end and the parties are at last are one. The importance of having written evidence of the terms of a compromise is well understood, litera scripta manet; verbum ut inane perit. It was never suggested in the Court below that the completion of the compromise preceded the signing of the petition, and is would be a mere invitation to the parties to give false evidence to allow such case to be set up now. The petition was, I have no doubt, intended to prove the terms of the compromise and I doubt whether oral evidence of them would be admissible with reference to Section 91 of the Evidence Act. 8. Lastly, it has been found that the compromise was not for the benefit of the plaintiffs. That finding, if sound, is alone sufficient to dispose of the plaintiffs' case. I dismiss the appeal with costs, fees on the higher scale.