Judgement

JAGANNADHADAS J. : This is an appeal on leave granted by the High Court of Punjab against its judgment affirming the decree of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal dated the 19th December, 1940, dismissing the plaintiff s suit. The plaintiff in the appeal is the Committee of Management of Sikh Gurdwaras within the Municipal limits of Amritsar (except the Gurdwara Sri Akal Takhat Sahib, Amritsar). The plaint was filed under section 25-A of the Sikh Gurdwaras Act, 1925, (Punjab Act VIII of 1925) (hereinafter referred to as the Act) for possession of certain properties situated in Amritsar, marked and bounded as specified in the plaint and purporting to have been declared as a Sikh Gurdwara by the Government of Punjab under Section 17 of the Act by means of the notification No. 9.G dated the 3rd March.1937.

The case of the plaintiff-Committee is that these properties were, and were determined to be, a Sikh Gurdwara, by name Gurdwara Bunga Sarkar, by the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal by its decree dated the 4th November, 1935 and confirmed on appeal therefrom by the High Court of Judicature at Lahore, on the 16th June, 1936 and that accordingly the Committee was entiled to possession of the properties. The facts that have led up to the present appeal are as follows : After the Act was passed and within one year of its commencement the then existing non-statutory Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee filed a list under section 3 of the Act claiming the suit properties and certain other items attached thereto as belonging to the Gurdwara Harmandir Sahib. These properties comprised two items called Bunga Sarkar and Bunga Mai Mallan and the shops appurtenant to each of them.

Objections were filed to this list by way of two applications under Section 8 of the Act claiming these as private properties. One was by Sardar Balwant Singh dated the 8th March 1928 and the other was by Sardar Raghbir Singh dated the 10th March, 1928. Sardar Raghbir Singh claimed the whole of Bunga Sarkar and its appurtenant shops as well as 1/3rd of the Bunga Mai Mallan and of the appurtenant shops. Sardar Balwant Singh s claim was confined to 1/3rd share in Bunga Mai Mallan and in the appurtenant shops. The other 1/3rd share in Bunga Mai Mallan was apparently treated by these claimants as belonging to some other person who was not a party to these proceedings.

These two applications were forwarded under Section 14 of the Act to the Gurdwara Tribunal for its decision. The parties to these proceedings entered into a compromise on the 6th February, 1930. There were two compromises one relating to each of the applications. The net effect of the compromises was that some out of the items claimed were admitted to be the private property of the respective claimants and the rest as wakf bungas for the Yatries to Sri Darbar Sahib, that the non personal properties were to remain in the management of the claimants, their heirs and representatives as such wakf with certain stipulations as to how that management was to be carried on. The Tribunal disposed of the two applications before them in terms of these compromises.

It may be mentioned that though the original list under Section 3 of the Act was filed by the then non-statutory Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, the compromises were entered into by the Managing Committee of the Gurdwaras within the limits of the Municipal Committee, Amritsar, which presumably had already by then been formed under Section 85 of the Act. Now, quite independently of these proceedings before the Tribunal, and prior to the filing of the list under Section 3 and of the objections under Section 5 above referred to, there had been filed a petition under Section 7 of the Act, signed by 55 Sikhs, claiming these very properties as being in themselves a Sikh Gurdwara by name Bunga Sarkar (Maharaja Ranjit Singh Saheb) and enclosing a list of properties as belonging thereto under section 7 (2)of the Act.

It does not appear that this petition was br