Kolkata: The Birlas today (Dec 2, 2004) stated in the High Court that a mutual Will could not be revoked if one of the two persons who made it died, claiming that as such the purported Will of Priyamvada Birla bequeathing Rs 5000 crore worth assets of the M P Birla group to Rajendra S Lodha was void.

Appearing for the Birlas, at the hearing of Lodha's application for discharge of the Birlas' caveats, barrister Satyabrata Mukherjee submitted before Justice Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta that the concept of mutual Will was very much valid in India, contrary to the claim made by Lodha.

Mukherjee submitted that the provisions of a mutual Will could be changed or the Will itself revoked only when both the persons who made it were alive, but not after one of them died.

He submitted that the question of M P Birla having died intestate, as claimed by Lodha, had not been decided, and as such Lodha could not claim that the Birlas had no caveatable interest in the matter on this ground.

The hearing on Lodha's application, for discharge of caveats by K K, B K, G P and Yashovardhan Birla on Lodha's probate application for the Will of 1999, vide which Priyamvada purportedly bequeathed the assets of the M P Birla group to Lodha, concluded today.

Justice Sengupta reserved judgement on the matter, which would be delivered at a later date.