MAHANT GAJRAJ PURI Vs. ACHAIBAR PURI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS suit was instituted in the Court of the Subordinate Judge of Gorakhpur in July, 1886. The original Plaintiffs, now represented by the Appellant, claimed right to three villages in the Gorakhpur district, called Belwa, Anarhua, and Bhartarsota, which had been in the possession of one Zalim Puri for some years prior to his death in 1884, and which after that event were registered in April, 1885, by the Revenue authorities in the name of his son, the Respondent Achaibar Puri, and have since been possessed by him or on his behalf by his mother as his guardian. The Subordinate Judge gave effect to the Plaintiffs' claim, but on appeal his judgment was reversed by the High Court of Allahabad.

(2.) THE question is one of succession. The Plaintiffs were not related to Zalim Puri, but have rested their claim to the villages in question on the allegation that he was a fakir of the Nihang Section and that his property consequently passed, not according to the ordinary rules of succession to his natural heirs, but according to the rules of religious succession to the Plaintiffs claiming to be his fellow disciples.

(3.) THE Plaintiffs alleged that Sukh Lal Puri, guru (preceptor) of Zalim Puri, and Mahant Jaikishen Puri, guru of the Plaintiffs, were spiritual brothers, that is disciples of the same guru; that this gaddi (seat of a Mahant) belonged to the Nihang order, being ascetics who live in a state of celibacy; and that the rule of succession is that a guru is succeeded by his disciple, and in default of a disciple by his spiritual brother, and in his default by his spiritual cousin; and the Plaintiffs claimed right to succeed to the property of Zalim Puri as his spiritual cousins, he haying died without leaving any immediate disciple.