GUTTA RAMAYYA Vs. MANIPALLI SATYANARAYANAMURTHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this action, two members of the public have proceeded with a view to having a scheme, framed for the administration of a trust, which is contained. in the will of one Manda Manikyam. The will appointed three trustees of whom two died pending the suit, leaving defendant 1 as the remaining trustee. The purposes of the trust were two: (1) the establishment of a feeding choultry, and (2) the construction of a Vishnu temple. The trustees were directed that if one of them was not willing to act, the other two should appoint a third person, and provision was made, in words that in English, are extremely ambiguous, in the event of one of the trustees dying. The learned Judge has directed a scheme to be framed and has construed the will as providing for a feeding choultry that is to be open to all poor persons, Brahmins or otherwise, and is not to be restricted to the feeding of students. The trustees have in the past been using the choultry which was established as a hostel for students. The plaintiffs say that it should be used for the feeding, and only of Brahmins. The learned Judge has not agreed with either view, but has taken the view, which we think is correct on the true construction of this will, that it was the intention of the settlor to have a choultry established for the feeding of all manner of persons who were poor or in need of food. With the learned Judge's interpretation of the will we are in entire accord. The next point of dispute relates to the temple. It is not quite clear what the exact amount of the assets that can be devoted to these trusts is, but a figure round about Rs. 26,000 has been mentioned, and the plaintiffs are not apparently at this stage in a position seriously to contest that figure.

(2.) The exact figure can only be determined when accounts have been taken as directed in the decree as modified in the manner provided herein. The trustees have taken up an attitude as regards the temple that is not entirely unreasonable, seeing that the feeding choultry is also a charge upon the trust funds, viz., that the building of a temple and the maintaining of that temple, is hardly practical with so small a trust fund. The learned Judge has on the other hand taken the view that there are temples and temples and that there is no need here for the building of a large and magnificent temple but that a small temple at a small cost can be constructed, and in his opinion the allocation of one quarter of the trust funds will be sufficient for the building of the temp and the maintaining of it in a humble way. We see no reason to disagree with his conclusion. The defendants raise the point, however, that the suit is not maintainable by the plaintiff's at all, for they say that the only part of the trust that is or can be operative owing to the financial condition of the settlor's estate is the feeding choultry, that the plaintiffs are not poor people and are not therefore directly interested in the choultry. As to the temple, that they say is a matter for the Hindu Religious Endowments Board. The answer is that the matter has been put before the Hindu Religious Endowments Board and they have quite properly taken the view that as there is no temple in being, it is not a matter at this stage for them, and it follows directly in our opinion that any member of the public who is interested in the building of a Vishnu temple, such as the plaintiffs are, is entitled to bring this scheme suit. Having brought this scheme suit in right of their interest in having the trust relating to the temple carried out, it then becomes necessary for the Court to consider the trust as a whole.

(3.) It would be idle and a waste of the Court's time to split the trust into two, restricting these plaintiffs to the litigation of matters relating to the temple and leaving somebody else to litigate matters so far as the feeding choultry is concerned at some subsequent date. We think therefore that the learned Judge was quite right in upholding the maintain-ability of the suit. It is then said by the defendant trustee that he has been wrongly mulcted in costs. The costs he has been made liable to pay are not large, but possibly are substantial to him. It is not customary to make a trustee personally liable unless he has done something that is not merely technically wrong but unreasonable or unrighteous, and it is said that these trustees have done what they have done with the best intention. Before arriving at a conclusion as to that, it is desirable shortly to mention what they have done. They have been directed in the will to collect the outstandings and realise the other properties and expend the moneys so obtained in the two ways I have mentioned, namely establishing a choultry and feeding poor people and building and maintaining a temple. They have realised the assets, but instead of expending the sums so obtained in the manner mentioned above, they have lent the money out. It is not clear exactly how they have lent the moneys out; from the statement of facts contained in an order appointing a receiver, it would appear that most of the moneys collected has been invested on mortgages. Whether those mortgages are first mortgages, or whether they are proper mortgages in the sense that the security is adequate, is not clear. A statement has been made before us, which we are not able to test, that a substantial part has been lent on hand loans. To the extent these moneys have been lent on hand loans, there has been technically a breach of trust, trust properties having been invested in non-trustee securities. Whether that is an innocuous breach of trust or not depends on whether there has been a loss to the estate.