The relief sought by the petitioners for the appointment of a trustee can be sought only in a suit under Section 92 of the Code, and the petitioners had no locus standi to make the application under the scheme.

Wallace, J.

1. This C.M.A. and C.R.P. are against the order of the lower Court dismissing an application presented under a scheme decree in A.A. Order 218 of 1925 on the file of the High Court. Under Rule 2 in that scheme, which was for the management of the Anjukoil Devasthanam, it is declared that when a vacancy occurs in the trusteeship the Pandara Sannadhi for the time being of Thiruvannamalai mutt shall be appointed trustee unless the District Court of Ramnad for any valid reason decides him to be unfit.

2. The late Pandara Sannadhi who was the trustee died on 10th June 1928. The petitioners applied under this rule on 25th June 1928: to the lower Court to declare respondent 1, who claimed to have succeeded as Pandara Sannadhi, to be unfit for appointment as trustee and to appoint either one of the petitioners or some other proper person to be trustee and for other reliefs. The District Judge dismissed the application, holding that Rule 2 of the scheme is ultra vires and the petitioners came up by way of appeal and revision. It is conceded that no appeal lies and the case has been argued as one in revision.

3. In the lower Court it was alleged by the petitioners, inter alia, that respondent 1 has not been lawfully appointed as Pandara Sannadhi and therefore was unfit to be a trustee. But the argument before us has proceeded on the footing that he is the Pandara Sannadhi de facto, entitled, if Rule 2 is not ultra vires, to be appointed as trustee unless otherwise found unfit, and it is urged that the petition should be reopened for enquiry as to his fitness. The respondents maintain that (1) the rule itself is ultra vires, (2) that even if it is intra vires the petitioners under the scheme have no locus standi to apply. A third point viz., that the High Court had no jurisdiction to frame a scheme at all was not pressed here.

4. To take the second objection first, the only persons to whom the scheme gives liberty to apply for directions are the trustee, the Board and the Advocate General: see Rule 13. It is not open to any person to come up under the scheme and ask for directions. If it is held that any person can come up under Rule 2 and ask for directions there is no reason why such a liberty should be restricted to that rule and not apply to any rule under the scheme, and Section 13 would become not only meaningless but misleading. I do not subscribe to the contention that the petitioners petition is not one asking for directions. If, as is assumed by the petitioners, Rule 2 vests the power of appointment of the Pandara Sannadhi in the District Court, then clearly the petitioners are asking for directions that the Pandara Sannadhi is unfit to be the trustee and for further directions that one of them or some one else, be appointed. This point will be more fully discussed later.

5. In C.M.P. No. 5606 of 1928 a Bench of this Court consisting of the Chief Justice and myself held, in interpreting a similar scheme, that when liberty to apply is confined by a rule under the scheme to particular persons, no others have locus standi to apply, and that to permit others to apply is in effect to modify the scheme, which is not permissible in law except by suit under Section 92. I may say, however, that if Rule 2 is intra vires I see no objection to the petitioners putting in a memo of information to the District Court merely reporting the death of the Pandara Sannadhi and asking the District Court to function under Rule 2 and applying for permission to be heard when the Court is holding its enquiry as to the fitness of the succeeding Pandara Sannadhi to be trustee. But that would be a petition outside the scheme and whether it would lie in law depends on the answer to the second point whether Rule 2 is not ultra vires.

6. On this point the respondents main argument is that the petitioners in applying for the appointment of a trustee other than the Pandara Sannadhi are asking for a relief which can only be granted by way of suit un