R.L.Narasimham and B.N. Jha JJ.

1. This is an application under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution to quash the order of the President of the Bihar State Board of Religious Trusts, dated the 7th June, 1967, appointing a committee to administer a religious trust. The President of the Board has purported to exercise the powers conferred on him by the Bihar Hindu Religious Trusts Act, 1950 (hereinafter referred to as the Act). There was formerly some ambiguity as to whether the Act would apply both to public and private religious trusts; but in Mahant Ram Saroop Dasji v. S.P. Sahi , their Lordships have made it absolutely clear that the Act would apply only to public religious trusts and not to private religious trusts.

2. The trust was alleged to have been created by the petitioner herself by an arpannama dated the 15th July, 1940. According to the petitioner, however, the said document was executed by her on account of the fraudulent persuasion, of some of her enemies, and no such trust was created neither in law or in fact. It is, however, admitted that, after the coming into force of the Act, the petitioner submitted the statutory returns to the Board for two years,