The court held that a sale of a superstructure on land belonging to a religious institution is invalid without specific sanction, impacting leasehold rights and the legitimacy of injunction claims.

JUDGMENT :

C. KUMARAPPAN, J.

1. The 2^nd defendant in O.S.No.465 of 2005 before the Trial Court is figured as appellant herein in S.A.No.639 of 2001. The plaintiff is the 1^st respondent and 1^st and 3^rd defendants are arrayed as the respondents 2 and 3 in S.A.No.639 of 2001. Similarly in S.A.No.502/2012, the sole defendant in O.S.No.161 of 2006 is the appellant herein and the plaintiff is the respondent. The plaintiff as well as the defendant are the sons of one Pichai Pillai.

2. For the sake of convenience, the parties will be referred to according to their litigative status in O.S.No.465 of 2005.

3. The brief facts which give rise to the instant two Second Appeals are that, the land in which the house was built belongs to the 1^st defendant. It appears that the 1^st defendant has leased out the site to one Nagarathinam Thavilkarar, as he was doing service to the temple. After the lease it appears that he put up a superstructure thereon and he sold the superstructure to one Govindan Nainakar and after the demise of Govindan Nainakar, the superstructure devolves upon her wife Angammal. It appears that said Angammal had executed a Will in favour of her sister's daughter namely Janaki by virtue of a Will dated 26.08.1933, giving life estate to the property and leaving the vested remainder to her sons namely Pichaipillai, Radhakrishnan and Chinnaniayan. It appears that Chinnaiyan died as a bachelor. Thus, the estate devolves upon Pichaipillai and Radhakrishnan. According to the plaintiff, there was a partition between Pichaipillai and Radhakrishnan on 31.08.1967. In that partition 'A' schedule property namely the northern half of the property was allotted to Pichaipillai and 'B' schedule property namely the southern half was allotted to Radhakrishnan. While so, the plaintiff has purchased the southern half of the superstructure from Radhakrishnan on 25.06.1997.

4. It is the case of the plaintiff that he being the teacher and away from the suit property, the 2nd defendant has encroached upon the same and took possession over the superstructure. It is also the case of the plaintiff that after encroaching upon the suit property, he has subleased the portion of the property to the 3rd defendant. Therefore, the plaintiff has come up with a prayer for mandatory injunction directing the 1^st defendant to enter the lease hold right of the plaintiff in the register maintained by them and also directing the defendants 2 & 3 to handover the vacant possession of the suit property.

5. The said suit was resisted by the 1^st defendant by contending that they have already recognised the 2^nd defendant as their lessee as he has been doing service to the temple. It is also the contention of the 1^st defendant that the alleged sale deed which was obtained by the plaintiff will in no way bind upon them as the same it is contravene the Section 34 of the Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowments Act,1959. Hence prayed to dismiss the suit.

6. The 2^nd defendant has filed separate written statement, wherein he has disputes the sale deed executed by Radhakrishnan on 25.06.1997. It is also the contention of the defendant that after the demise of Radhakrishnan, he took care of his wife Amirthavalli. While so, the said Amirthavalli had permitted him to use the superstructure of the suit