No Idol Installed, No Endowment Created: Allahabad HC Dismisses Suit Over Mirzapur Property Claimed as Lord Rama's Debutter

The Allahabad High Court dismissed a second appeal, holding that without consecration of any idol of Lord Rama, no juristic person ever came into existence to sustain the suit.

The Allahabad High Court has dismissed Second Appeal No. 505 of 2026 filed by the plaintiffs — described as the next friends of the idol of Lord Rama — who sought to challenge the rights of the defendants over property in District Mirzapur. Justice Anil Kumar-X, sitting singly, affirmed concurrent findings of the Civil Judge (Junior Division), Mirzapur and the District Judge, Mirzapur, holding that a gift deed dated 17 August 1949 did not create a valid religious endowment because no idol of Lord Sri Ramchandra was ever consecrated or installed over the disputed property. Since no juristic person ever came into existence, the court found the entire suit had no legal foundation. The second appeal was dismissed on 28 July 2026.

The Dispute Before the High Court

The original suit, Civil Suit No. 861 of 2022 (originally numbered Original Suit No. 265 of 2014), was instituted before the Civil Judge (Junior Division), Mirzapur. The plaintiffs described themselves as Hindus with deep faith in Lord Rama and claimed to be the next friends of the deity. They asserted that Late Kedar Nath Mishra had acquired property comprising several gata numbers in Mirzapur pursuant to a permanent lease dated 13 March 1947, and that the entire consideration for the lease had been paid by Late Kailash Nath Agrawal.

On 17 August 1949, Kedar Nath Mishra executed a gift deed transferring the property to Kailash Nath Agrawal. The deed contained two key stipulations: first, that an idol of Lord Sri Ramchandra would be installed over the property; and second, that neither Kailash Nath Agrawal nor his successors would have any right to alienate the property or use its income for personal benefit. Kailash Nath Agrawal was designated Manager of the property under the deed.

The plaintiffs alleged that the defendants, who are the legal heirs of Kailash Nath Agrawal, had dealt with the property as private owners — partitioning it among themselves and selling portions of it — in violation of the conditions in the deed. They came to know of these acts on 13 April 2011 and submitted representations to the District Magistrate, Mirzapur, before filing the suit when no action was taken.

The reliefs claimed were: a declaration that the defendants had ceased to have any right to act as Managers of the property; a decree of permanent injunction restraining them from transferring or alienating the property; and a decree of mandatory injunction directing the concerned administrative authorities to take over management of the property.

The defendants denied the creation of any endowment. They contended that no temple had ever been built and no idol had ever been installed. They stated that they and their predecessors had openly possessed and dealt with the property as owners since at least 1967, when a cold storage and residential houses were constructed, and had been selling portions of the property since 2000. They also pleaded that the condition restricting alienation in the gift deed was void under the Transfer of Property Act.

A Lengthy Procedural Route

During the pendency of the suit, the defendants filed an application under Order VII Rule 11 of the Code of Civil Procedure seeking rejection of the plaint on the ground that the plaintiffs had no right to institute a representative suit under Order I Rule 8 CPC. The Trial Court allowed this application on 11 December 2017 and rejected the plaint.

The plaintiffs appealed. Civil Appeal No. 42 of 2018 was allowed by the appellate court on 18 July 2018, setting aside the rejection order and directing the Trial Court to proceed with the suit. The defendants then challenged that appellate order before the Allahabad High Court in F.A.F.O. No. 3841 of 2018.

The High Court, while deciding F.A.F.O. No. 3841 of 2018, held that the gift deed of 1949 constituted an endowment deed creating a valid endowment in favour of Lord Sri Ramchandra, and that the property stood vested in the deity as a juristic person. It also held that, the endowment being a private one, Section 92 CPC was not attracted, and a representative suit under Order I Rule 8 was maintainable. Crucially, the court clarified at that stage that it was only examining whether the plaint disclosed a cause of action on its face, not whether the plaintiffs would ultimately succeed.

The matter then proceeded to a full trial. The Trial Court framed fourteen issues. After recording evidence and hearing arguments, it dismissed the suit by judgment dated 29 May 2024 and decree dated 13 June 2024. The District Judge, Mirzapur affirmed that dismissal by judgment dated 24 March 2026 and decree dated 30 March 2026 in Civil Appeal No. 9 of 2024. The present second appeal followed.

The Legal Issues in the Second Appeal

The appellants pressed fourteen proposed questions of law before the High Court. They ranged from whether a worshipper could maintain a suit to protect debutter property of a private endowment, to whether the Trial Court had erred in applying Section 10 of the Transfer of Property Act to the deed of dedication, and whether the courts below had contradicted the earlier High Court judgment in F.A.F.O. No. 3841 of 2018.

The central legal question was whether the gift deed of 1949, read with the admitted fact that no idol was ever installed, could sustain a conclusion that a valid religious endowment had come into existence — and, in its absence, whether the plaintiffs had any enforceable right at all.

The appellants also argued that the first appellate court had misread the reliefs claimed in the plaint by treating the prayer for mandatory injunction against administrative authorities as a claim against the defendants, and had wrongly non-suited the plaintiffs on the ground of non-joinder of necessary parties when that issue had already been decided in the plaintiffs' favour by the Trial Court without any appeal or cross-objection by the defendants.

How the Bench Reasoned

Justice Anil Kumar-X began by noting that the fourteen proposed questions of law did not, in fact, fall within the ambit of Section 100 CPC. Relying on the Supreme Court's formulation in Sri Chunilal V. Mehta and Sons Ltd. v. The Century Spinning and Manufacturing Company Ltd., AIR 1962 SC 1314, the court held that a substantial question of law must be debatable, not previously settled by binding precedent, and must have a material bearing on the rights of the parties. The questions raised by the appellants essentially assailed the appreciation of evidence and factual conclusions concurrently recorded by both courts below, and no fresh interpretation of law was required.

Nevertheless, the court proceeded to examine the principal contentions on the merits.

The first and decisive finding concerned the non-installation of the idol. The plaintiffs themselves had admitted in the plaint that no idol of Lord Sri Ramchandra was ever consecrated or installed over the property pursuant to the gift deed. The court held that this admission was fatal to the entire claim. It applied the principle laid down in Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, Amritsar v. Shri Som Nath Dass and Others, AIR 2000 SC 1421, that a Hindu idol acquires the status of a juristic person only after its consecration and installation in accordance with religious customs. Until that occurs, the deity cannot be treated as a legal person capable of holding property or being represented through a next friend.

“Since the plaintiffs have themselves admitted that no idol was ever installed, the very foundation of his claim to represent the deity disappears.”

The court also examined the character of the 1949 deed itself. It noted that no temple was ever constructed, no arrangement was made for a priest or for daily worship, and no religious institution was ever established. The property remained in the possession of Kailash Nath Agrawal during his lifetime, devolved upon the defendants as his legal heirs, and their names were duly recorded in the revenue records. They dealt with the property as owners for decades.

Applying the principle from Mirza Hidayat Beg v. Seth Behari Lal, AIR 1941 All 225, the court held that a mere recital in a document that property is dedicated to a deity is insufficient to constitute a valid endowment. The real intention of the executant must be gathered from the document as a whole and from subsequent conduct. Where the donor does not effectively divest himself and the property continues to be enjoyed by the donee and his successors as their own, no religious endowment is created.

The court further held that the stipulation in the deed restraining the donee and his successors from alienating the property was void under Sections 10 and 126 of the Transfer of Property Act, as it amounted to an absolute restraint on alienation in the context of a gift. This invalidity did not affect the validity of the gift itself; it meant only that the defendants could not be legally restrained from dealing with the property on the basis of that clause.

On the question of locus standi, the court addressed an internal inconsistency in the Trial Court's findings. The Trial Court had decided Issue No. 12 — relating to the plaintiffs' locus to sue — in their favour, while simultaneously finding on Issue Nos. 1 and 2 that no valid endowment existed and the defendants held valid rights. Justice Anil Kumar-X held that this was irreconcilable. Once it was found that no valid endowment had come into existence and no juristic person existed in whom the property could vest, it necessarily followed that the plaintiffs had no locus standi to seek a declaration against the defendants or to claim consequential injunctions. The finding on Issue No. 12 could not be sustained alongside the findings on Issues 1 and 2.

The court dealt separately with the appellants' reliance on the earlier judgment in F.A.F.O. No. 3841 of 2018. It held that the observations made in that judgment about the maintainability of the representative suit were made only for the limited purpose of deciding whether the plaint was liable to be rejected at the threshold under Order VII Rule 11 CPC. At that stage, the court was confined to the averments in the plaint and was not adjudicating their correctness. That judgment neither finally determined the nature of the 1949 deed nor conferred any substantive locus standi upon the plaintiffs. The appellants could not rely on it as a binding determination of those questions after a full trial.

On the non-joinder point, the court accepted the first appellate court's reasoning. The plaintiffs had specifically sought a decree of mandatory injunction directing administrative authorities to take over the property. Since those authorities were not impleaded, no effective mandatory injunction could be issued against them, as such relief operates in personam and cannot bind a party not before the court.

The court rejected the three Supreme Court precedents cited by the appellants — Ram Janmbhumi Temple Case, (2020) 1 SCC 1; Bishwanath and Another v. Sri Thakur Radha Ballabhli and Others, 1967 SC 1044; and Kt. N. Rm. Thenappa Chettiar and Others v. N. S. Kr. Karuppan Chettiar and Others, AIR 1968 SC 915 — on the ground that they did not lay down any law contrary to the conclusions reached in the present case.

The court also observed that the plaintiffs' claim was founded entirely on their devotion towards Lord Sri Ramchandra. “Devotion towards Lord Sri Ramchandra… does not confer any enforceable civil right to question the ownership or management of private property.” They had not pleaded or established any independent right of worship, and the admitted non-installation of the idol meant there was no temple whose rights they could seek to vindicate.

Outcome

Justice Anil Kumar-X dismissed Second Appeal No. 505 of 2026 on 28 July 2026. Both impugned orders — the judgment and decree of the Civil Judge (Junior Division), Mirzapur dated 29 May 2024 and 13 June 2024, and the judgment and decree of the District Judge, Mirzapur dated 24 March 2026 and 30 March 2026 — were upheld. The suit filed by the appellants stands dismissed. No substantial question of law was found to arise for consideration under Section 100 CPC.