The suit filed under Section 92 of the Code of Civil Procedure must be within the scope of the Trust Deed, and the principles of res judicata apply to prevent repetitive suits for the same relief.

JUDGMENT

(Prayer: Memorandum of Grounds of Original Side Appeal filed under Order XXXVI, Rule 1 of the Original Side Rules read with Clause 15 of the Letters Patent, against the judgment dated 19.08.2019 passed in C.S.No.497 of 2018 on the file of the Original Side of this Court.)

T. Raja, J.

1. Agila Munnal Pond's Employees Nalasangam represented by its President and Mr.K.C.Sebastian, General Secretary have brought this appeal, aggrieved by the order of revocation of leave and the rejection of plaint in C.S.No.497 of 2018 passed by the learned single Judge, on the ground that when the appellant Nalasangam was registered under the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act on 4.10.2016 for the welfare of the former employees of Ponds India Limited with the object of promoting social and financial betterment of the former employees of Ponds India Limited, the fourth respondent took over the Ponds India Limited and after amalgamation of the three Trusts, namely, Ponds Employees Welfare Trust created in May, 1980; Ponds Management Staff Welfare Trust incorporated in July, 1981 and the Ponds Supervisory Staff Welfare Trust formed in November, 1984, the beneficiaries of the aforementioned Trusts were deprived of their benefits, as the fourth respondent failed to carry out the objects of the three Trusts in spite of repeated reminders. When the Trust had the corpus of Rs.1,765,00,00,000/-, the said amount has not been utilized by the fourth respondent for the benefit of the members of the Trusts, as a result, all the ex-employees of Ponds India Limited have suffered. Therefore, on 22.01.2016, 22.02.2016 and 05.02.2018, the appellants wrote letters to the fourth respondent requesting to provide medical assistance and other benefits to the retired employees, who are the members of the appellant Nalasangam. Although the fourth respondent received the letters, failed to send any reply. When the fourth respondent refused the medical claim and other benefits to the members of the Trusts on the ground that no surplus fund was available, the appellants/plaintiffs filed the suit for evolving a scheme for proper administration of the above Trusts after merging the same into a single Trust by appointing two more persons who are the office bearers of the appellant Nalasangam to be the trustees of the Trust and for furnishing the statement of accounts relating to the corpus fund as well as the reimbursement of medical expenses and other benefits to the beneficiaries. It is also the claim of the appellants that when the respondents 1 to 3 were founded, established and situated for providing medical assistance to the retired employees of the appellants, they are entitled to question how the trustees are administering the corpus fund and the trustees are also duty bound to answer how the corpus fund of the Trusts are being spent. Moreover, it has been learnt from reliable sources that the corpus fund of the Trusts were diverted to various other activities depriving the true beneficiaries, namely, the members of the appellants. Therefore, Application No.5036 of 2018 was filed seeking leave to file the above suit under Section 92 of the Code of Civil Procedure for the reliefs claimed thereunder and when the learned single Judge, while allowing the said application, came to the prima facie conclusion that it is a fit case where the leave is to be granted, the fourth respondent/Hindustan Unilever Limited, cannot maintain the Application No.375 of 2019 to revoke the leave granted in Application No.5036 of 2018 to file the suit in C.S.No.497 of 2018.

2. Mr.M.K.Kabir, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the appellants contended that the order passed by the learned single Judge revoking the leave granted to the appellants/plaintiffs is unsustainable in law, since the learned single Judge has ignored the contention of the appellants that the objects of the three Trusts specifically state that the trustees may at any time invite and receive or without such invitatio