Chennai: The Madras high court has suspended a portion of its earlier order in so far as it related to a direction to the Official Trustee, appointed by it to administer the day-to-day functions of PT Chengalvaraya Naicker Trust temporarily, to invite applications for appointing fresh candidates as trustees to the trust.
A Division Bench comprising Justices R. Sudhakar and S. Vaidyanathan suspended the operation of a portion of the order passed by another division bench on January 29.
The bench was passing interim orders on miscellaneous petition arising out of a civil suit from M. Balakrishnan and six others, present trustees, challenging the January 29 order.
Suspending a portion of the order in so far as it related to calling for fresh appointments, the Bench took note of the fact that the existing trustees have not been heard, they have not been removed from trusteeship and their term was not over, and said the direction given by the earlier Bench would run contra to the original order dated October 8, 2014.
“The rights of the existing trustees, who are now before us, have to be considered as their plea of removal without being heard will be in violation of principles of natural justice”, the court added.
The bench said, moreover, the appointment of new trustees would result in chaos between the sitting trustees and fresh trustees, as the former continue to hold the posts as per the October 2014 order.
Posting the matter for February 25, the Bench said the parties concerned were at liberty to suggest names of former judges of this court, on whom they have trust and faith, to discharge the duties of the trustee-cum-Chairman of the Trust.
Originally, the high court had on October 8, 2014, appointed Justice A. K. Rajan, a retired judge of Madras high court, as Chairman of the Trust and also appointed board of trustees.
Since Justice Rajan resigned from the post alleging intimidation, harassment and ill-treatment by other trustees, a Division Bench comprising Justices S. Tamilvanan (since retired) and G. Chockalingam had accepted his resignation and directed the Administrator General and the Official Trustee of Tamil Nadu to administer temporarily the functions of the trust and gave a direction to him to invite applications for appointing fresh candidates as trustees.
