A PACHAIAPPA GOUNDER ALIAS PACHAIAPPA POOSARI Vs. SPECIAL COMMISSIONER AND COMMISSIONER HINDU RELIGIOUS AND CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) HEARD Mr. N. Manokaran, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. T. Chandrasekaran, learned Special Government Pleader for the respondents.

(2.) AS against the order of the second respondent dated 20.6.1995 passed in O.A.No.27 of 1993 which was under Section 64 of the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act, 1959 (for brevity, "the Act") settling a scheme, if anybody is aggrieved his right is only to file an appeal under Section 69(1) of the Act, which is as follows:"Section: 69. Appeal to the Commissioner.- (1) Any person aggrieved by any order passed by the Joint Commissioner or the Deputy Commissioner, as the case may be, under any of the foregoing sections of this chapter, may within sixty days from the date of the publication of the order or of the receipt thereof by him as the case may be, appeal to the Commissioner and the Commissioner may pass such order thereon as he thinks fit."The said provision enables the affected party to file an appeal to the Commissioner, viz., the first respondent within sixty days.

(3.) ON the face of it, the present writ petition is not maintainable. The case of the petitioner is that when the petitioner and his family members have been in control of the temple for many generations, the applicants in O.A.No.27 of 1993 without even making the petitioner as a party have obtained an order under Section 64(1) of the Act by way of settled scheme by playing fraud on the petitioner by not making him as a party. The petitioner is certainly a person aggrieved as per Section 69(1) of the Act and such person aggrieved has a right of appeal which is an effective remedy given under the statutory provision. When such effective remedy is available, it is certainly not open to the petitioner to compel the first respondent to exercise suo motu powers under Section 69(2) of the Act, especially when the decree passed in O.A.No.27 of 1993 is in detail with reasons.