NEW DELHI: If a person does not protest someone illegally occupying his property for 12 years, then the squatter would get ownership rights over that property , the Supreme Court has ruled.A bench of Justices R K Agrawal and A M Sapre said if a person proved actual, peaceful and uninterrupted possession of a property owned by another for more than 12 years, “a case of adverse possession can be held to be made out which, in turn, results in depriving the true owner of his ownership rights in the property and vests ownership rights of the property in the person who claims it“.However, the bench put in a caveat by ruling that such a person (squatter) must necessarily first admit ownership of the true owner over the property and make the true owner a party to the suit before a court for claiming ownership over the property through adverse possession.This ruling came in a case where a Muslim man had claimed ownership over a property through adverse possession in Jalgaon of Maharashtra. He had attempted to advance the plea of adverse possession to claim ownership rights over the property , which was inherited by a Muslim woman after the death of her father.Setting aside a Bombay high court order in favour of the man, the SC bench said, “When both courts below held and, in our view rightly , that the defendant has failed to prove the plea of adverse possession, then such concurrent finding of fact was unimpeachable and binding on the HC. The HC erred fundamentally in observing that it was not necessary for the defendant to first admit the ownership of the plaintiff before raising such a plea.“The man's next plea was that he was the adopted son of the deceased original owner and hence was the rightful owner of the property. “The plea taken by the defendant about adoption for proving his ownership over the land as an heir of the original owner was rightly held against him. He has failed to prove that he was the adopted son. It is a settled principle of Mohammadan law that it does not recognise adoption,“ said Justice Sapre, who wrote the judgment for the bench.The court gave ownership rights to the woman who had inherited the land from her father.