No protective interim orders before leave is granted in a Section 92 trust suit, rules Supreme Court

A Division Bench holds that a civil court cannot pass preservatory interim orders while a Section 92 CPC leave application is pending, but may grant leave without prior notice in genuinely urgent cases.

A civil court hearing a suit about a public charitable trust cannot pass protective or preservatory interim orders until it has first decided whether to grant leave to institute the suit. That is the Supreme Court’s answer, in S. Panchalingu v. People’s Education Trust, decided on 18 September 2026, to a recurring question in trust litigation. A Division Bench of Justice Manoj Misra and Justice Manmohan dismissed the appeals, holding that the power to make interim protective orders does not exist during the pendency of an application for leave under Section 92 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 — while clarifying that leave itself may be granted without prior notice where urgency compels it.

The substantial question

Section 92 of the Code governs suits concerning public trusts of a charitable or religious character, and requires the leave of the court before such a suit can be instituted. The substantial question of law framed by the Court was whether a civil court, seized of a plaint under Section 92 together with an application seeking leave to institute the suit, has the power to pass protective or preservatory interim orders during the pendency of that leave application.

The dispute reached the Court from Karnataka. By its judgment dated 25 June 2025, the High Court of Karnataka reaffirmed its earlier view on the scope of a Section 92 suit and set aside an order dated 2 May 2025 passed by the Principal District and Sessions Judge. The appellants carried that decision to the Supreme Court, contending that once a court is seized of a Section 92 application it must be able to protect the trust property in the interim.

Leave first, protection after

The Court treated the requirement of leave as a threshold that stands on a distinct footing, describing Section 92 as sui generis with no exact analogue elsewhere in the Code. At the stage of considering leave, the Bench reasoned, the court neither adjudicates the merits of the controversy nor confers substantive rights on the parties. Because the leave application is not itself a substantive proceeding in which rights are determined, the court is not, at that stage, clothed with the power to pass protective or preservatory interim orders.

The Court drew on its earlier pronouncement in R.M. Narayana Chettiar for the proposition that, in keeping with the object and language of Section 92, notice to the proposed defendants ought ordinarily to precede the grant of leave. It balanced what it called the two objectives of the provision — a “protective shield” for the charity and a “remedial sword” against mismanagement.

The urgency exception

The bar is not absolute at the leave stage. The Court held that for compelling reasons recorded in writing — where the facts disclose the necessity of urgent relief — notice prior to the grant of leave may be dispensed with, and leave may be granted ex parte. A suit instituted pursuant to leave granted without notice is not thereby rendered bad in law or non-maintainable. The defendants are not left without a remedy: they remain entitled to seek revocation of the leave, which must then be adjudicated on its merits and in accordance with law.

In granting leave, the Court added, the civil court must record prima facie cogent reasons, so that the ex parte route is used with discipline rather than as a matter of course.

Order

Answering the substantial question, the Court held that a civil court seized of a Section 92 plaint together with a leave application is not empowered to pass protective or preservatory interim orders pending disposal of the leave application, subject to the clarification that notice before the grant of leave may be dispensed with for compelling, recorded reasons of urgency. With that clarification, the appeals were dismissed and pending applications disposed of.