KUMARASWAMY ASARY Vs. (POOJARI) LAKSHMANA GOUNDAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against the judgment and decree of the Subordinate Judge of Salem in O.S. No. 4 of 1916, dated 30 November 1925. The suit relates to the temple of Sri Kandasami in the village of Kalipatti in the Salem District. The temple was founded by one Lakshmana Goundan, the grandfather of defendant 1. He died about the year 1856 or 1857. Defendant 2 who was the son of defendant 1 was added as a party. He has since died and his sons have been added as his legal representatives. The plaintiffs are Hindu worshippers of the temple. They instituted the suit for a scheme of management. Defendant claimed that the temple was a private temple. The Subordinate Judge, Mr. Narayana Ayyar, found it to be a private temple. On appeal to the High Court, Abdur Rahim and Old field, JJ., differed, the former finding that the temple was a public temple and the latter holding it to be a private one. A decree was therefore made dismissing the appeal and from that decree the plaintiffs appealed under the Letters Patent, and three learned Judges who heard the appeal, Sadasiva Ayyar, Seshagiri Ayyar and Burn, JJ., delivered separate but concurring judgments finding that the temple was a public one. Against this an appeal was preferred to the Privy Council who decided that the temple was a public one. The suit was therefore remanded for framing a scheme. It is against the scheme so framed that the present appeal is preferred and the main question at issue is whether the lands which now stand in the name of defendant 1 should be treated as temple property or whether they should be held to belong to defendant 1. The learned Subordinate Judge has held that they belong to defendant 1.

(2.) That the properties in dispute stand in the name of defendant 1 is not denied. The argument of the learned advocate for the appellants is briefly this: The temple having been found to be a public one, it must be presumed that all offerings made to the God were the property of the God and that as it is admitted that the suit properties must have come practically entirely out of the offerings to the God, they must be held to be the property of the God of which defendant 1 was only a trustee. It is further argued that the learned Subordinate Judge wrongly threw the onus of proof under these circumstances on to the plaintiffs. For the other side, it is contended that the temple having been admittedly a fairly recent one and there being no written deed of the dedication, usage must determine the nature of the trust and that in fact the gifts were offered on the understanding that, after defraying the expenses of the temple, the remainder should go to the founder and his heirs. It is also contended that the onus of proof that these lands which stand in the name of defendant 1 are temple properties was rightly laid on the plaintiffs. The whole evidence being before us, the question of onus is not very important.

(3.) The history of this temple has been narrated in several judgments in the case and it may be summed up in the words of their Lordships of the Privy Council: Lakshmana Goundan" the grandfather of defendant 1" lived in a small house which belonged to him in the village of Kalipatti. He was a devout Hindu and originally a poor man. He maintained in his house an idol of the goddess of Amman, which was the private idol of his family. He was also a devout worshipper at the public temple at Palni at which there was an idol of the God Subramaniaswami, and he made yearly pilgrimage to Palni with offerings to that God. It is said, and probably with truth, that he dreamt that he should install at his house at Kalipatti an idol of the God Subramaniaswami and that the God would come to his house and enable him to foretell events. He did install that idol at his house, adopted the ritual which was followed at Palni, and allowed Brahmins and other Hindus of various castes to worship the idol as if it was a public idol. He acted as the pujari of the idol and received the pujari offerings made to the idol by worshippers and fees which he charged in respect of processions and other religious services. He obtained a great reputation as a holy man and as being; enabled by the God to foretell events.