Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee vs Lt. Sardar Raghbir Singh and Others

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: Supreme Court of India

Case Number: Civil Appeal No. 11 of 1954

Decision Date: 24 March 1955

Coram: B. Jagannadhadas, Vivian Bose, Bhuvneshwar P. Sinha

In this case the Supreme Court recorded that the plaintiff was the Committee of Management for all Sikh Gurdwaras situated within the municipal limits of Amritsar, except the Gurdwara Sri Akal Takht Sahib. The committee had been constituted before the year 1930. By virtue of section 85(2) of the Sikh Gurdwaras Act, 1925 (Punjab Act VIII of 1925), this committee became the body concerned with the suit Gurdwara. The court noted that certain proceedings under the Act relating to the disputed properties were finally decided by the High Court on 16 June 1936. Following that decision a notification was issued under section 17 of the Act on 3 March 1937. The court explained that, as a result of the decision and the subsequent notification, the plaintiff acquired the right to obtain possession of the disputed properties by filing a suit before a tribunal under section 25-A of the Act. Such a suit had to be filed within one year from either the date of the High Court decision or the date of the committee’s constitution, whichever was later. The plaintiff filed the present suit on 25 February 1938, which was more than one year after the High Court decision. The central issue, therefore, was whether the suit could be treated as having been instituted within one year of the committee’s constitution. The plaintiff contended that the committee should be regarded as having become the committee concerned with the suit Gurdwara only on the date of the 1937 notification, invoking the provisions of sections 86 and 88. The court held that the 1937 notification could not be considered the date of constitution for purposes of section 25-A. It further held that section 86 did not apply to Gurdwaras within the municipal limits of Amritsar specified in section 85, where a committee already existed. Accordingly, under sub-section (2) of section 88, the date of publication of the 1937 notification, concerning a committee that had existed since 1930, was the constitution date within the meaning of section 25-A. Consequently the court concluded that the suit was barred by limitation.

The judgment was rendered in civil appellate jurisdiction as Civil Appeal No. 11 of 1954, an appeal from the judgment and decree dated 20 June 1950 of the High Court of Judicature for the State of Punjab at Simla, arising out of the decree dated 19 December 1940 of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal, Lahore, in Suit No. 11 of 1938. The bench comprised Justice B. Jagannadhadas, Justice Vivian Bose and Justice Bhuvneshwar P. Sinha. The citation for the case was reported as 1955 AIR 455 and 1955 SCR (2) 67. The court’s decision affirmed the decree of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal that had dismissed the plaintiff’s suit, thereby upholding the limitation bar. The judgment was delivered on 24 March 1955.

The appeal arose from a decree dated 19 December 1940 issued by the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal in Lahore in Suit No. 11 of 1938. The decree had been affirmed by the High Court of Judicature for the State of Punjab at Simla in Regular First Appeal No. 73 of 1941, the judgment of which was handed down on 20 June 1950. Counsel for the appellant consisted of lawyers representing the Committee of Management of Sikh Gurdwaras within the Municipal limits of Amritsar, except the Gurdwara Sri Akal Takhat Sahib, Amritsar. Counsel for respondents numbered one and two appeared together, while another lawyer represented respondents three to five. The judgment of the Supreme Court was delivered by Justice Jagannadhadas. This proceeding was an appeal on leave granted by the High Court of Punjab against its own judgment that had upheld the Tribunal’s decree dismissing the plaintiff’s suit.

The plaintiff in the appeal, identified as the Committee of Management of Sikh Gurdwaras within the Municipal limits of Amritsar (excluding the Gurdwara Sri Akal Takhat Sahib, Amritsar), had instituted the original suit under section 25-A of the Sikh Gurdwaras Act, 1925 (Punjab Act VIII of 1925), hereinafter referred to as “the Act”. The suit sought possession of several properties situated in Amritsar, which were described and bounded in the plaint. The plaintiff asserted that these properties had been declared Sikh Gurdwaras by the Government of Punjab pursuant to section 17 of the Act through Notification No. 9-G dated 3 March 1937. According to the plaintiff-Committee, the properties had previously been determined to be a Sikh Gurdwara named Gurdwara Bunga Sarkar by the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal in its decree of 4 November 1935, a determination that had been confirmed on appeal by the High Court of Judicature at Lahore on 16 June 1936. On the basis of those findings, the Committee claimed a right to possession of the properties.

The factual background leading to the present appeal was as follows. After the enactment of the Act and within one year of its commencement, the then-existing non-statutory Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee filed a list under section 3 of the Act, alleging that the suit properties and certain adjoining items belonged to the Gurdwara Harmandir Sahib. The list identified two principal assets, namely Bunga Sarkar and Bunga Mai Mallan, together with the shops attached to each. Subsequently, two applications were filed under section 8 of the Act contesting the claim that these assets were public Gurdwara property, each seeking to have the respective assets recognised as private property. The first application, dated 8 March 1928, was made by Sardar Balwant Singh and asserted a one-third share in Bunga Mai Mallan and its appurtenant shops. The second application, dated 10 March 1928, was filed by Sardar Raghbir Singh, who claimed the entirety of Bunga Sarkar and its shops, and additionally a one-third share in Bunga Mai Mallan and its shops. The remaining one-third share in Bunga Mai Mallan was apparently regarded by the claimants as belonging to an unidentified third party who was not a party to these proceedings. Both applications were transmitted to the Gurdwara Tribunal for decision under the provisions of section 14 of the Act.

Following the filing of the objection applications under section 8 of the Act, the matters were sent to the Gurdwara Tribunal for determination pursuant to section 14. On 6 February 1930 the parties to the two applications reached compromises, one for each application. The effect of those compromises was that certain items claimed were acknowledged as the private property of the respective claimants, while the remaining items were designated as wakf bungas intended for the pilgrims visiting Sri Darbar Sahib, with the stipulation that the non-personal properties would continue to be managed by the claimants, their heirs and representatives as a wakf, subject to specific rules for that management. Accordingly, the Tribunal resolved the two applications in accordance with the terms of the compromises. It is relevant to note that although the original list under section 3 of the Act had been filed by the then non-statutory Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, the compromises were executed by the Managing Committee of the Gurdwaras within the jurisdiction of the Municipal Committee of Amritsar, which had presumably already been established under section 85 of the Act. Independent of these Tribunal proceedings and prior to the filing of the section 3 list and the section 5 objections, a petition filed under section 7 of the Act had been submitted, signed by fifty-five Sikhs, asserting that the very same properties constituted a Sikh Gurdwara named Bunga Sarkar (Maharaja Ranjit Singh Saheb) and enclosing a schedule of properties in accordance with section 7(2). This petition does not appear to have been brought before the Gurdwara Tribunal when it issued its decree based on the compromises relating to the section 5 objections. The petition under section 7 was subsequently followed by a governmental notification dated 18 February 1930 issued under section 7(3). That notification gave rise to two developments: first, an objection under section 8 filed by the Granthis asserting that the premises were not a Sikh Gurdwara; and second, two further objections filed on 5 April 1930 by Sardar Raghbir Singh and Sardar Balwant Singh under section 10, in which they claimed ownership of the properties and contested the characterization of the premises as Sikh Gurdwaras. The notification under section 7(3) was issued only a few days after the compromise decrees in the section 5 proceedings, and it is unclear whether those compromises were communicated to the Government. The objections under sections 8 and 10, together with the original petition under section 7, were referred to the Tribunal for adjudication under section 14. The objection under section 8 lodged by the Granthis was contested by the statutory Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, and after taking evidence, the Tribunal arrived at its conclusions.

The Tribunal concluded that Bunga Sarkar was a Sikh Gurdwara and formally declared it as such on 28 August 1935. In the matters brought under section 10, notices were sent to the Committee of Management and to the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee; however, both bodies declined to become parties to the proceedings. Consequently, the contest under section 10 proceeded solely between the claimants and the Sikh individuals who had filed the petition under section 7. During the hearing before the Tribunal, each side relied on the earlier compromises to support its respective claim. By its decision dated 4 November 1935, the Tribunal held that the properties previously declared to belong to Sardar Raghbir Singh and Sardar Balwant Singh were to be recognized as their personal properties, while the remaining properties claimed to belong to Bunga Sarkar and Bunga Mai Mallan were to be declared Sikh Gurdwaras and to constitute properties appurtenant to those Gurdwaras. The Tribunal further declared that these two Gurdwaras, together with the adjoining properties, should vest in the management of Sardar Raghbir Singh and Sardar Balwant Singh in accordance with the terms of the compromises. Two appeals against these decrees were filed by Sikh worshippers in the High Court. The principal issue raised in those appeals was the legality of the Tribunal’s direction that the management of the properties should remain with the claimants, Sardar Raghbir Singh and Sardar Balwant Singh. The High Court, without deciding the substantive legal question, expressed the view that it was not within the jurisdiction of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal to issue an order under section 10 directing that the claimants manage the properties attached to the Gurdwaras by virtue of the compromises. The Court therefore suggested that the question of management rights should be left open, that the portions of the Tribunal’s decree concerning management be removed, and that the remainder of the decree should stand. In its wording, the High Court stated: “That portion of the decree of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal which has declared the respondents’ right to manage the Gurdwaras and the properties appended thereto shall form no part of the decree granted by the Tribunal; the rest of the decree of the Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal stands, that is to say, the properties which have been declared to be the personal properties of Sardar Raghbir Singh and Sardar Balwant Singh shall remain their properties and the properties which have been declared to be appended to the two Gurdwaras shall remain the properties of the two Gurdwaras.” The High Court further observed that, although the proceedings mentioned two Gurdwaras by name—Bunga Sarkar and Bunga Mai Mallan—the factual situation appeared to be that only one Gurdwara, namely Bunga Sarkar, existed, and that Bunga Mai Mallan was in fact a well-known part of Bunga Sarkar. This decision of the High Court was delivered on 16 June 1936.

The Court observed that, in reality, only a single Gurdwara existed, namely Bunga Sarkar, and that Bunga Mai Mallan did not function as an independent Gurdwara but was merely a well-known portion of Bunga Sarkar. The High Court rendered this finding on 16 June 1936. Subsequent to that decision, the authorities issued Notification No 9-G on 3 March 1937 under section 17 of the Act; this notification forms the basis of the present suit. On the foundation of these facts, both parties presented a series of contentions before the High Court and again before this Court. The judgment delivered by the High Court and the oral arguments heard here spanned a wide range of issues. Turning to the merits, the plaintiff’s position proved straightforward. The plaintiff contended that, irrespective of any earlier compromises reached between the parties in the proceedings under section 5 of the Act, the later proceedings under section 10 of the Act concerning the same properties culminated in the High Court judgment dated 16 June 1936. The plaintiff argued that this judgment was conclusive and binding. Consequently, by virtue of that judgment and the subsequent notification dated 3 March 1937, the plaintiff claimed entitlement to possession of the disputed properties under section 25-A of the Act.

The defendants, on the other hand, advanced several objections which may be summarised as follows. First, they asserted that the proceedings under section 10 did not produce any explicit declaration in favour of the Committee that the disputed properties constituted a Sikh Gurdwara or belonged to a Sikh Gurdwara; they noted that no such declaration could be extracted from the Tribunal’s decision of 4 November 1935 nor from the High Court’s decision on appeal of 16 June 1936. Second, the defendants maintained that the Tribunal lacked jurisdiction to entertain an application under section 10 of the Act seeking a positive declaration that the property was a Sikh Gurdwara; the Tribunal’s sole function was to determine whether the claimed properties were private property of the claimants. Therefore, even if the Tribunal’s and the High Court’s decisions were construed as declaring the properties a Sikh Gurdwara, such a declaration would be invalid and any resulting notification would be void. Third, the defendants argued that any such declaration would contravene section 37 of the Act and the doctrine of res judicata, rendering the decision a nullity on that ground. Fourth, they alleged fraudulent conduct by the Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee and the relevant Committee of Management: they claimed that these bodies entered into compromises in the section 5 proceedings without disclosing the pending petition filed by fifty-five Sikhs under section 7, subsequently refused to be made parties to the section 10 proceedings, and effectively promoted the contest of the proceedings under sections 8 and 10; on this basis, the defendants said the Committee was estopped from relying on the decree obtained under the section 10 proceedings.

In this case, the Court observed that the respondents could not rely on the decree obtained in the section 10 proceedings to support any claim for relief. The Court explained that a suit under section 25-A is permissible only when the decision on an objection under section 10(1) is rendered after a notification declaring the Gurdwara to be a Sikh Gurdwara has been published, because section 25-A refers to a decision in favour of a “Notified Sikh Gurdwara,” which presupposes the prior existence of such a notification. The Court further held that the suit presented under section 25-A was barred by limitation. It also noted that the entire appeal before the High Court was abated because one of the respondents, Sardar Balwant Singh, died while the appeal was pending. Since his legal representatives were not brought on record within the prescribed time, the High Court refused to excuse the delay or set aside the abatement; consequently, the claim against both respondents, which was joint, could not be pursued against a single respondent in the absence of the other. In addition to these arguments advanced by both parties, the High Court’s decision was based on the view that section 7 of the Act presumes the existence of a Gurdwara, and that a notification issued under section 7(3) when no Gurdwara actually exists would be ultra vires. Applying this reasoning to the present facts, the Court found that, owing to the earlier proceedings under section 5 and the compromises thereafter, the alleged non-existence of the Gurdwara as asserted in the petition under section 7(1) must be taken as established; therefore, the notification and all subsequent proceedings were illegal and ultra vires. Although extensive arguments were presented on each of these points, the Court concluded that the plea of limitation was decisive against the appellants and that it was therefore unnecessary to address the remaining contentions. The Court then examined the limitation provision contained in section 25-A, which states: “When it has been decided under the provisions of this Act that a right, title or interest in immovable property belongs to a Notified Sikh Gurdwara, or any person, the Committee of the Gurdwara concerned or the person in whose favour a declaration has been made may, within a period of one year from the date of the decision or the date of the constitution of the Committee, whichever is later, institute a suit before a tribunal claiming possession of the right, title or interest in the immovable property in question as against the parties to the previous petition, and the tribunal shall, if satisfied that the claim relates to the right, title or interest in the immovable property which has been held to belong to the Gurdwara, or to the person in whose favour the declaration has been made, pass a decree for possession accordingly.” The provision further provides that, notwithstanding any contrary law, the court-fee payable on a suit filed under this section shall be five rupees.

The provision states that the court-fee payable on the plaint in such a suit shall be five rupees. That same provision also sets the limitation period for filing a suit, namely one year counted from whichever is later – the date of the decision or the date on which the committee of the Gurdwara was constituted. In the present matter the relevant decision must be identified as the date on which the High Court, on appeal, disposed of the proceedings under section 10, which was the 16th day of June, 1936. The suit in question, however, was presented on the 25th day of February, 1938, which is clearly beyond one year from that decision date. Consequently the Court had to consider whether the suit could be regarded as having been filed within one year of the constitution of the committee of the concerned Gurdwara. To resolve this, reference was made to sections 85, 86 and 88 of the Act in order to determine which committee was applicable to the Gurdwara in dispute and the precise date of its constitution. Section 85, insofar as it is relevant, provides: “Subject to the provisions of section 88, there shall be one committee for the Gurdwaras known as the Darbar Sahib, Amritsar, and the Baba Atal Sahib, and all other Notified Sikh Gurdwaras situated within the municipal boundaries of Amritsar other than the Sri Akal Takht Sahib.” Section 86, insofar as it is relevant, declares: “For every Notified Sikh Gurdwara other than a Gurdwara specified in section 85 a committee shall be constituted after it has been declared to be a Sikh Gurdwara under the provisions of this Act.” Section 88, insofar as it is relevant, states: “(1) The committees described in sections 85 and 86 shall be constituted as soon as may be after the constitution of the Board, provided that no committee shall be constituted for any gurdwara under the provisions of this Act unless and until it has been declared to be a Sikh Gurdwara under the provisions of this Act. (2) When all the members of any committee described in section 85 have been elected or co-opted, as the case may be, according to the provisions of that section, the Provincial Government shall notify the fact that the committee has been duly constituted, and the date of the publication of the notification shall be deemed to be the date of the constitution of the committee.” It is not contested that the present plaintiff – the Committee of Management for all the Gurdwaras situated within the municipal limits of Amritsar, excluding the Gurdwara Sri Akal Takht Sahib – was constituted prior to 1930 and was functioning at the time of the compromises in the section-5 proceedings dated 6th February, 1930. It is also undisputed that, by virtue of section 85(2), this Committee became the Committee concerned with the Gurdwara that is the subject of the suit, which is undeniably located within the municipal limits of Amritsar. Nevertheless, the appellants contend that this Committee only became the concerned committee for the suit Gurdwara from the date when the notification under section 17 was issued, namely the 3rd day of March, 1937, and that consequently the one-year limitation should be measured from that later date.

The appellants argued that the committee became concerned with the suit Gurdwara only when the notification under section 17 was issued on 3 March 1937. Accordingly, they contended that the plaintiff had a one-year period for filing the suit starting from that notification date. They further submitted that section 25-A, which provides an alternative limitation period of “one year from the date of the constitution of the committee,” should in this case be interpreted to mean one year from the date of the notification. For the purpose of section 25-A, the appellants maintained that the pre-existing committee must be deemed to have been constituted for the suit Gurdwara only on the date the notification was published. To support this view, they pointed to the policy expressed in sections 86 and 88 of the Act, which stipulates that no committee may be formed for a Gurdwara until after the Gurdwara has been declared a Sikh Gurdwara under the Act. They urged that the phrase “constitution of the committee” in section 25-A should therefore be read to refer to a point in time no earlier than the notification of the Gurdwara, and that, in such circumstances, the date of that notification should be treated as the date of the committee’s constitution.

The Court found this contention untenable. It observed that section 86 deals with notified Sikh Gurdwaras other than those specified in section 85, and therefore its policy does not necessarily apply to the Gurdwaras within the municipal limits of Amritsar for which a committee already existed. Moreover, sub-section (2) of section 88, which relates to committees formed under section 85, expressly provides that once all members have been elected or co-opted, the fact must be duly notified, and that the date of publication of that notification shall be deemed to be the date of the committee’s constitution. In view of this explicit deeming provision, the Court held that it is impermissible to assign any other date as the committee’s constitution for any purpose under the Act, nor may one imply an exception or addendum to that provision. To do so would amount to legislating, which the Court could not accept. Consequently, the Court declined to accept the appellant’s argument that the notification date under section 17 should be treated as the constitution date of the committee for the purposes of section 25-A. The Court also noted that the appellant’s view would deprive the committee of the benefit of the longer alternative limitation period, and that where no notification under section 17 had been issued until after the expiry of a year from the date of the final decision that the Gurdwara claimed…

In the present matter, the Court observed that if the property in question were a Sikh Gurdwara, the relief provided by section 25-A would not be available. The Court acknowledged that an exceptional situation involving an undue delay in publishing the required notification could constitute a casus omissus, but it emphasized that such a delay should not be presumed to occur as a matter of course. The Court further noted that the present case did not fall within that exceptional category because the notification had actually been issued within nine months after the High Court’s decision. The Committee, which was expected to be vigilant about these procedural requirements, possessed the entire nine-month period to act to secure an earlier publication of the notification, and in addition it had a further three months after that period in which it could have instituted the present suit. The Court held that, notwithstanding any arguments to the contrary, no hardship could be identified, since section 25-A is merely an enabling provision that offers a relatively inexpensive remedy through a suit before the Tribunal itself. Consequently, the Court was of the clear view that the suit filed under section 25-A was time-barred by the limitation period, and that this ground alone warranted the dismissal of the appeal. Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed with costs, and the order of dismissal was affirmed.