The main legal point established was the hereditary nature of the temple trusteeship and the requirement to follow the procedure for succession as per the settlement deed, emphasizing the importance of notice to hereditary trustees before appointing an Executive Officer.

ELIPE DHARMA RAO, J.

The challenge in this Writ Appeal is to the order passed by a learned single Judge of this Court dated 212. 1998 made in W.P.No.13280 of 1990, whereby the learned single Judge has affirmed the order of appointment of an Executive Officer to the Arulmighu Thirunarayanaswamy Thirukoil, Pudupettai, Thirupattur, by the first respondent.

2. The case of the appellant is that Arulmighu Thirunarayanaswamy Thirukoil, Pudupettai, Thirupattur is a private temple and his father Kanniappa Chettiar was the Managing Trustee of the temple. Originally, one Kanniappa Chettiar, who was the appellant’s father’s paternal grand father’s elder brother, along with one Muniappa Chettiar, who is also related to the said Kanniappa Chettiar have purchased a site at Pudupet on 18. 1985 and built a place of worship, wherein Thiru Narayanaswami was worshipped by ‘bhajan’ and it was known as ‘Thiru Narayanaswami Bhajanai Koil’ and the same seems to have ruined, but rebuilt later, on a large scale, by the paternal grand father of the appellant on 12. 1918 and also performed ‘Kumbabhishekam’ on 17. 1921. It is seen from the records that the paternal grand father of the appellant and one T.M.Murugappa Chettiar purchased some properties on 17. 1927, 3. 1936 and 23. 1939 and endowed them to the temple.

3. On 110. 1945, the paternal grand father of the appellant and his three paternal uncles by name Muniswami Chettiar, Ramu Chettiar and Chandrasekara Chettiar along with one Murugappa Chettiar, who is none other than their brother-in-law, have executed a settlement deed in favour of the institution and thus the above said institution is claimed to be the family property of the appellant’s paternal grand father and his paternal uncles and according to the appellant, third parties have no right to manage or perform any Utsavam or Bhajan without the permission of the above said families. Pursuant to the above said settlement deed dated 110. 1945, the grand father of the appellant was appointed as the Managing Trustee and the trusteeship was to devolve on their legal heirs by rule of heredity. It is said that on the death of the junior most paternal uncle of the father of the appellant, the father of the appellant became the Managing Trustee in terms of the Settlement Deed dated 110. 1945. When the Area Committee of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Board included this institution as a place of public worship and called for applications for appointment as Trustees, the father of the appellant filed an application before the Deputy Commissioner, Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Board, Madras, in O.A.No.35 of 1963 praying to declare them as the hereditary trustees and that the institution was a place of private worship and the prayer in this application was later on amended to declare that the institution was governed by the principle of hereditary trusteeship alone. Since the said application was dismissed by the Deputy Commissioner on 5. 1971, an appeal was filed before the Commissioner and the Commissioner also dismissed the appeal on 22. 1972. Therefore, aggrieved, the father of the appellant had filed a suit in O.S.No.77 of 1972 on the file of the Sub Court, Thirupattur and since the said suit was dismissed, an appeal in A.S.No.122 of 1973 was filed before this Court.

4. A learned single Judge of this Court has allowed the said appeal by the judgment dated 112. 1977. The observations and findings recorded by the learned single Judge in the said A.S.No.122 of 1973, since will have a bearing on the matter on hand, are extracted hereunder:

“In the present case, there is no evidence to show that the provisions of Section 47(2) have any manner of application. In these circumstances, the Deputy Commissioner had no jurisdiction to appoint any non-hereditary trustee for the purpose of managing the affairs of the temple. In this view, the plaintiff (P.Kanniappa Chettiar-the father of the present appellant) would be entitl