KALPATARU DAS Vs. BALKRISHNA PATRO AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Plaintiff is the Appellant. He filed the suit against the Commissioner of Hindu Religious Endowments Orissa, Cuttack and four others for a declaration, that the temples of Raghunath Jiew and Hanuman jiew known as Kulia Math and the properties standing in the names of the said deities are not public religious endowments but are private Debottar properties of the Plaintiff and the said properties and premises of the Muth attached to those are not a Muth within the meaning of Section, sub -Section 7 of the Orissa Hindu Religious Endowments Act and for setting aside the decision of Defendant No. 1, the Commissioner of Hindu Religious Endowments, Orissa, dated 30 -5 -1945 and for a permanent injunction restraining Defendant No. 1 from taking any action under the said Act.

(2.) THE Plaintiff's case, in brief, is that he was a Grihastha that the suit endowments are his private endowments that the ancestor Gopal Das who installed the deities was also Grihastha that his successors Iswar Das, Dasarathi Das and himself were also Grihasthas each being the adopted son of his ancestor that consequently the endowments are not public endowments and the institution is not a Muth and that therefore the order made under Section 64(1) should be set side.

(3.) THE Plaintiff examined 10 witnesses in support of his case and filed Exts. 1W4. Exts 1 to 1 (h) are the rokad books of Kalpataru Das from 1343 to 1352, It can be seen that the account books of the institution filed by the Plaintiff are only the account books during his time. No account books of the institution prior to his time, that is, during the times of Gopal, Iswar Das and Dasarathi Das which are very material to the case, and which would show the history of the institution are filed by him. Exts. 2 series are the sale deeds executed in favour of Iswar Das and Dasarathi Das by various vendors beginning from 1895, Ext. 3 series are certified copies of Khatians of mouza Kulia and Baroda and Ext. 4 is a hand note executed by Siba Rout in favour of Mahant Iswar Das dated 5 -10 -1882