SIR DINSHAW MANOCKJI PETIT Vs. SIR JAMSETJI JEEJEEBHOY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The seven plaintiffs in the suit are members of the Parsi community of Bombay. They profess the Zoroastrian religion. The five defendants are also members of the same community and profess the same religion.

(2.) The Parsis in India are descendants of a body of Persians who wore, about 1200 years ago, compelled to leave their Fatherland owing to religious persecution at the hands of the Mahomedans. This body of Persians, after taking refuge in Kohistan and afterwards in the Isle of Ormus, eventually made their home in India, and at the present time Bombay is their principal headquarters.

(3.) Since their advent into India they have continued to follow the religion of their forefathers, and wherever they have settled in any appreciable numbers they have built for themselves Atash Behrams, Agiaries, and Dare Mehers for the performance of their religious worship and the observance of their religious rites and ceremonies and erected Dokhmas for the disposal of their dead according to the dictates of their religion. Their places of worship are ordinarily spoken of: as Fire Temples and their Dokhmas as Towers of Silence.