R THATHADESIKA THATHACHARIAR Vs. K V ALAGAI MANAVALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal by certificate is from the judgment and decree of the High court of Madras passed in Letters Patent Appeal No. 45 of 197 4/09/1976, arising out of a suit for mandatory injunction.

(2.) We have heard learned counsel S/shri K. Parasaran and T. S. Krishnamoorthy iyer. We have been taken through the judgment under appeal and other relevant material. The dispute, as it appears, is within a very narrow compass. In the ancient temple of Sri Devarajaswami at Kancheepuram in the state of Tamil Nadu, the Vaishnavites of the two sects named Thengalai and vadagalai are the devotees performing worship. On festive occasions such as the annual procession the presence of an elephant is a must. Normally an elephant had been maintained by the temple. On the forehead of the elephant the distinctive mark of the sect was painted. This has been the practice for decades. Evidence was led in the suit to the effect that whenever at one point of time or the other, the temple had no elephant of its own the respective sects brought their own elephants for ceremonial purposes. Claiming the exclusive right to the use of the temple elephant and for painting its forehead with its own distinctive mark the Thengalai sought a mandatory injunction from the Munsif's court asserting that the elephant maintained by the temple was meant for use by that sect alone to the exclusion of the Vadagalai sect. This claim was refuted by the vadagalai sect. It claimed that it had a right to use the elephant of the temple and paint its forehead with its own distinctive mark. Otherwise, the parties were agreed that when paint on the forehead of the elephant required removal for wiping out one distinctive mark to be replaced by the other, the process was painful to the elephant. The Thengalai sect has been successful throughout and has obtained the requisite injunction.

(3.) It now transpires that the temple elephant is dead and another one has not so far been procured. The periodic ceremonials and worship, as has been stated at the Bar, have been carried on with the private elephants of the respective sects.