Judgment.- The plaintiffs who failed in the Courts below are the appellants in the Second Appeal. One Thangavelu, maternal grandfather of the plaintiffs executed a settlement deed Exhibit A-1 dated 27th October, 1944 under which he gave a life estate in the suit property to his daughter, Kanchanamala, and the vested remainder to his grandsons. The mother executed a surrender dated Exhibit A-2, dated 1st August, 1956, in favour of her children, with the result that the remaindermen became entitled to the present possession of the property from the date of Exhibit A-2. They have become the absolute owners of the property. The defendant obtained a decree against Kanchanamala in O.S. No. 1701 of 1956 for a sum of Rs. 1,300 and he sought to attach the property in the hands of the minors on the ground that the surrender made by the mother judgment-debtor, was not a bona fide transaction and that it was a fraudulent transfer intended to defeat and delay the claim of the creditors. The Courts below upheld the claim of the decreeholder in the view that it was brought about with a view to defeat and delay the creditors. It is impossible to sustain the view taken by the Courts below. 2. The matter has got to be decided under the provisions of section 53, Transfer of Property Act, read with section 5 of the same Act. Section 5 defines " transfer of property’ ‘in these terms: "In the following sections "transfer of property" means an act by which a living person conveys property, in present or in future, to one or more other living persons, or to himself and one or more other living persons ; and, "to transfer property" is to perform such act. (In this section "living person" includes a company or as sociation or body of individuals, whether incorporated or not, but nothing herein contained shall affect any law for the time being in force relating to transfer of property to or by companies, associations or bodies of individuals. " In order to attack a transaction under section 53, there must first be a transfer and that transfer must suffer under the infirmities mentioned in the said section. " In order to attack a transaction under section 53, there must first be a transfer and that transfer must suffer under the infirmities mentioned in the said section. The question is: If a person who is a life-tenant under a settlement deed walks out of the picture and accelerates the rights of the remaindermen, whether that would, amount to a ‘transfer’ within the meaning of the Transfer of Property Act, i.e., sections 5 and 53? 3. Cases have uniformly taken the view that a document of release, a document of relinquishment and document of surrender would not amount to a ‘transfer’ within the meaning of section 5. The important idea involved in a transfer is that under the transfer a person who got title or right conveys that right or title to the transferee, ‘which right the transferee acquires only in pursuance of the transfer. In the case of a surrender by a life-tenant in favour of the remaindermen, there is no transfer of property from the life tenant and there is merely an effacement or extinguishment of the rights of the life-tenant, with the result the rights of the remaindermen get accelerated. The rights of the remaindermen are derived only under the document executed by the full owner and when a surrender deed is executed, full rights accrue to the remaindermen only in pursuance of the title derived under the settlement and the remaindermen do not derive any title from or through the life-tenant who makes the surrender. In other words, there is only, a self-affacement on the part of the surrenderer, life-tenant,who goes out of the picture. 4. Reference may be made to the Bench decision in Makhandal Laha v. Nagendranath Adikar1in which the Bench has pointed out that the word ‘transfer’ has been used in a technical sense and under the Transfer of Property Act, transfers are sale, mortgage, lease, exchange and gift, and there is nothing in the Act to indicate that ‘surrender’ is a mode of transfer. It is observed: "The term "surrender" distinguished from transfer is very well known in law; a surrender is an yielding up of an estate for life or years to him that hath an immediate estate in reversion or remainder wherein the estate for life or years may merge by mutual agreement; it is the falling of a lesser estate into a greater." 5. It is unnecessary to labour this point in view of the decision of the Supreme Court in Natoarlal v. Dadhubhai 1in which the Supreme Court held that when the widow makes a surrender in favour of the reversioner there is no transfer of any property from the widow to the reversioner and that there is only a self-effacement on the part of the widow and extinguishment of her rights in the property and the entire rights of the reversioners spring only from the last owner through whom they claim title and nothing passes or is claimed through the widow; vide observations at p. 74 . 6. In Periakaruppau Chettiar v. Natarajan Chettiar 2the question was about the scope of a surrender by a widow during the period 30th September, 1937 and 31st January, 1948 under section 9-A of Madras Agriculturists’ Relief Act (IV of 3938). The argument that surrender by the widow amounted to a ‘transfer’ within the meaning of Act IV of 1938 was rejeced (vide observations at pages 615 and 616). 7. From the foregoing it will be seen that the grandsons, surrenderees, do not occupy the position of transferees in the sense that any title is transferred to the transferees, i.e., grandsons. what happens is that there is a civil death so far as the life-tenant is concerned and the grandsons become absolute owners of the property. There is no ‘transfer’ within the meaning of section 53. 8. The appeal is allowed and the plaintiffs’ suit, decreed. No costs in second appeal. Plaintiffs will be entitled to their costs in the Courts below. No leave. The defendant will pay the Court-fee due to Government in the trial Court and the lower Appellate Court. S.J. ------------------- Appeal allowed.