Quick answer: In Sharafat Ali v. Panjikrat Sarvajanik Trust Mandir Murti Shri Murli Manohar Ji, decided on 5 October 2026, Ashish Shroti J. of the Madhya Pradesh High Court (Gwalior Bench) dismissed four second appeals by tenants of shops in a Sheopur temple. A trust registered under the Madhya Pradesh Public Trust Act is exempt from the Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act, 1961 by the State’s notification of 7 September 1989. It need not plead or prove that its income is applied to its objects, and it may terminate a tenancy under Section 106 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 and sue for possession directly. A tenant cannot attack the trust’s registration collaterally in the eviction suit. One trustee may sue on a resolution authorising him.
1. Introduction
Rent control statutes protect tenants by restricting the grounds on which a landlord may recover possession. Most contain a power to exempt classes of premises, and exemptions for religious and charitable institutions are common. The practical question is how much an institution must show before it can claim the benefit: only that it falls within the notified class, or also that the facts behind the legislative exemption are true of it.
Sharafat Ali answers that question for Madhya Pradesh. A temple trust sought possession of shops let in 1978 at a rent of a few tens of rupees a month. The tenants argued that the trust was a family gathering dressed up as a public trust, that it had not proved that its income was used for the trust, and that the suit was incompetent because it was brought by a single trustee. The High Court rejected all three arguments in a common judgment on four second appeals.
This article sets out the facts and the three substantial questions of law, the Court’s reasoning on each, the strengths and weak points of that reasoning, and the consequences for landlords, tenants and trustees. The judgment is by a Single Judge and applies a Division Bench decision of the same Court. It breaks no new ground in doctrine, which is part of why it deserves attention: it shows how settled law operates against long-standing tenants of institutional landlords.
2. Case summary
Facts and procedural history
The respondent in each appeal is the same: a registered public trust that owns the temple of Shri Murli Manohar Ji at Main Bazar, Sheopur. Four tenants of shops on the first floor of the temple were defendants in four suits, and each suit ended in a decree for possession and arrears of rent against them. The first appeals were dismissed. Second Appeal Nos. 233 of 2021, 1860 of 2021, 814 of 2022 and 953 of 2022 followed. Because the issues were the same, the Court took the facts from S.A. No. 953 of 2022 (paragraph 4).
The trust pleaded that it was a public trust registered under the Madhya Pradesh Public Trust Act, and therefore exempt from the Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act, 1961 (the Act) by a notification under Section 3(2). By a resolution dated 31 December 2013, all the trustees authorised its working trustee to sue for eviction. The defendant in S.A. No. 953 of 2022 had been a tenant of a shop since 1978, at Rs. 100 a month according to the trust. The trust said it did not want to continue the tenancy because the rent was far below the local market rate. It served a notice dated 13 January 2014 terminating the tenancy and demanding arrears. The defendant neither paid, vacated nor replied, according to the trust, and the suit was filed on 2 April 2014 for possession, arrears and damages at Rs. 2,000 a month (paragraphs 5 to 7).
The defendant admitted the tenancy and the identity of the shop, but put the rent at Rs. 60. He denied that the plaintiff was a public trust, said that the working trustee had filed the suit with mala fide intent and that his tenure had expired, and said that it was the trust that had stopped accepting rent, which he had then deposited in court (paragraphs 8 to 10). The trial court decreed the suit on 18 November 2021. It held that the plaintiff was a public trust registered in 2013, that the rent was Rs. 60 a month, and that the tenancy had been validly terminated by the notice of 13 January 2014. The appeal was dismissed on 7 March 2022 (paragraphs 12 and 13).
The questions
The second appeals were admitted on three substantial questions of law (paragraph 14):
- Whether the trust is exempted from the Act and is competent to sue under Section 106 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882.
- Whether a suit by one trustee on the basis of a resolution passed by all the trustees is maintainable, or whether each trustee must be a party.
- Whether the courts below erred in holding the plaintiff to be a public trust.
The holding
On the third question, the Court held that Exhibit P-1, the Registrar of Public Trusts’ order registering the plaintiff at serial number 4 of 2013, and Exhibit P-6, an extract of the trust register, showed that the plaintiff was a public trust. The tenant’s complaint that the registration was wrong was “not open to be adjudicated” in the suit; his remedy lay under Section 27 of the Madhya Pradesh Public Trust Act, which he had not used (paragraphs 23 and 24).
On the first question, the Court held that the notification of 7 September 1989 exempts all public trusts registered in the State from the Act. Following the Division Bench in Scindia Devasthan v. Praveen Kumar Nigam, 2013(4) MPLJ 679, it held that a registered trust need not plead or prove that the whole of the income from the premises is used for the trust. Once registered, the trust “is not required to establish anything more”, and it could sue under Section 106 of the Transfer of Property Act (paragraphs 25 to 28).
On the second question, the Court relied on Ram Shankar v. Guru Singh Sabha, 2015(1) MPLJ 667, to hold that one trustee may sue on a resolution of the trustees authorising him, and that the point was “no more res integra” (paragraphs 30 and 31). All four appeals failed (paragraph 32).
3. Legal analysis
The statutory structure
Section 3(2) of the Act, as the Court describes it, lets the State Government, by notification, exempt from all or any of the Act’s provisions any accommodation owned by an educational, religious or charitable institution, “the whole of the income derived from which is utilized for that institution” (paragraph 25). The notification of 1989 used that power for all public trusts registered under the Public Trust Act in the State.
The consequence follows from the structure of the Act. As the Division Bench quoted in the judgment explained, an exempt trust is not obliged to plead and prove any ground of eviction listed in the sections of the Act that govern eviction (Sections 12 and 20, per the quoted passage), and may terminate the tenancy in accordance with Section 106 of the Transfer of Property Act and sue directly. The court then decides the matter on the scheme of Section 106 (paragraph 26, quoting Scindia Devasthan, paragraph 23).
Who must satisfy the “whole of the income” condition, and when
The tenants’ best argument was textual. The enabling provision speaks of premises “the whole of the income derived from which is utilized for that institution”. They said that this is a condition of the exemption, and that a trust which seeks to use the exemption must therefore show it is met.
The Division Bench answered this by placing the inquiry earlier in time and on a different actor. In its words, the requisite satisfaction on the use of income “is required to be examined by the State before issuing the notification”, and once the State has exempted all public trusts, a court “could neither direct nor expect” the plaintiff trust to plead or prove it (paragraph 26, quoting Scindia Devasthan, paragraph 24).
This reasoning is orthodox in its treatment of delegated power. A condition in an enabling section binds the authority when it exercises the power. When the authority has acted by a general notification, the individual beneficiary does not have to re-prove the authority’s satisfaction in every suit. The alternative would turn every eviction suit by a temple or charity into a trial of its accounts.
The reasoning has a weak point, which the judgment does not confront because the Division Bench decision closed the point. The notification, as the High Court records it, exempts every registered public trust. Whether every registered trust in fact applies the whole of the income from a given shop to its objects is a factual question the State could not have answered trust by trust in 1989. A notification keyed to registration treats registration as a proxy for the statutory condition. A tenant who can show that the trust is a private enterprise would say the proxy has failed. The judgment’s answer is that such a tenant must go to the registration, not to the suit, which leads to the next point.
The collateral attack
Having held on the documents that the plaintiff was a registered public trust, the Court refused to entertain the argument that the registration was a sham, because the remedy under Section 27 of the Madhya Pradesh Public Trust Act was open to the tenant and unused (paragraph 24). The judgment does not set out the terms of Section 27, so it does not say what that remedy involves, who may invoke it, or within what time.
The principle is sound. A registration order made by a statutory authority stands until set aside in the manner the statute provides, and a court trying a possession suit cannot sit in appeal over it. The rule also spares a trust from having its status re-litigated, with possibly conflicting results, in each suit against several tenants, as happened here.
The chronology is worth noting. The trust was registered in 2013, the resolution authorising the suit is dated 31 December 2013, the notice is dated 13 January 2014, and the suit was filed on 2 April 2014. A tenant in possession since 1978 was therefore sued by a landlord whose registration as a public trust was only a few months old when it served notice. The judgment records no finding that this timing indicated bad faith, and it did not examine the allegation that the trust was a family gathering, because the Court treated the registration as closed to challenge in the suit. Whether the statutory remedy is realistically available to a tenant who learns of a registration only when the notice arrives is a question the judgment does not discuss.
Section 106 and the freed landlord
Once the Act is out of the way, the law of eviction is the general law. A tenancy terminable under Section 106 of the Transfer of Property Act is ended by a valid notice, and the court’s inquiry shrinks to the validity of the notice, the existence of a tenancy and the landlord’s title to sue. In these appeals, those matters were not the subject of any substantial question. The tenants admitted the tenancy and the shop, disputing only the rate of rent (paragraph 8). The judgment says that other objections were raised but did not bear on the substantial questions (paragraph 11).
This reveals the real effect of the exemption. A tenant of a non-exempt landlord can insist that the landlord prove a statutory ground of eviction. A tenant of an exempt landlord can resist only by attacking the notice, the landlord’s status or the landlord’s capacity to sue. The tenant in S.A. No. 953 of 2022 said he had deposited the rent in court (paragraph 10), and that did not prevent a decree. The difference between the two regimes is the entire dispute.
Suit by one trustee
On the second question the judgment relies on Ram Shankar, quoting paragraphs 6 to 9. The tenants had relied on an earlier decision of the same Court, Ramsingh v. Shri Rajiv Lochan Trust, 1975 JLJ 471, for the proposition that a trust is not a legal entity and that all trustees must sue together (paragraph 16). Ram Shankar had reasoned that, on the Court’s earlier decision in Laxman, a suit by a trust may be brought by all the trustees or by one trustee with the sanction and approval of his co-trustees. It rejected the argument that “sanction and approval” requires the signature of every trustee, and noted that the suit there was neither against the interest of the trust nor a dispute between trustees. It observed that this view was in conformity with Ramgopal v. Balaji Mandir Trust, (2003) 5 SCC 17 (paragraphs 6 to 9 of Ram Shankar, as quoted in paragraph 30).
The result is sensible and the reasoning is adequate on these facts. All the trustees authorised the working trustee by resolution (paragraph 5), a stronger case than the one in Ram Shankar, where one trustee out of ten had not signed. The requirement of a resolution does the work that joinder would otherwise do: it shows that the suit is the trust’s decision and not a trustee’s private venture. The practical rule is that the resolution must exist, must authorise the suit, and must be proved.
The tenants also cited Indian Council Social Welfare v. State of A.P., (1999) 6 SCC 365, which the Court said “does not deal with the issue under discussion” (paragraph 27). Two limits should be noted. First, the High Court did not discuss Ramsingh separately; it treated the question as settled by the later authority. Whether Ramsingh survives on its own facts is therefore not clear from this judgment. Second, the tenant’s separate plea that the working trustee’s tenure had expired (paragraph 10) was not framed as a substantial question, and the judgment does not decide it. A trustee whose authority has lapsed is a different problem from one whose authority was never conferred by all.
How far the decision travels
This is a Single Judge applying a Division Bench ruling, and the notification it construes is specific to Madhya Pradesh. The case does not say that every exemption of this type dispenses with proof of the statutory condition; it says that this notification, which exempts all registered public trusts, does so.
4. Practical significance
For trusts and temple managements. The judgment confirms that the safest foundation for an eviction suit is a registered trust with the registration documents on the record. Here the Registrar’s order and the register extract (Exhibits P-1 and P-6) were enough. A trust should have both ready, and should also have the authorising resolution ready and prove it as a document. The resolution here named a working trustee and was passed by all trustees; a trust relying on a resolution passed by less than all will be exposed to the argument that Ram Shankar left open, and should be prepared with evidence that the absent trustees did not dissent.
The notice must still be a valid Section 106 notice. Exemption removes the need to plead rent control grounds. It does not remove the need to terminate the tenancy properly.
For tenants of institutional landlords. The main lesson is about timing and forum. A tenant who doubts that a landlord trust is genuinely public should consider the statutory remedy against registration as soon as the registration is known. Raising the point as a defence in the eviction suit will not work, on this judgment. A tenant should also not rely on depositing rent in court as a protection. The tenant in S.A. No. 953 of 2022 had deposited rent, and it did not prevent a decree.
The rent history still matters. In S.A. No. 953 of 2022 the trial court found the rent to be Rs. 60, as the tenant said, and not Rs. 100 as the trust claimed. The dispute over the rate was resolved on evidence even though possession could not be resisted.
For trustees. Where a trust has several trustees, a single sanctioned plaintiff is enough, and the trust avoids the cost of joining every trustee. The resolution should state the suit and the authorised person, and be dated before the suit. The tenure objection raised in paragraph 10 shows why the authorised person’s continued authority should be documented.
For advocates and courts. Eviction suits against tenants of exempt institutions are in substance suits on a tenancy terminated under the general law. Pleading and evidence should concentrate on three matters: the status of the plaintiff, the authority to sue, and the notice. A defence that rests on rent control grounds should be examined at the threshold to see whether the premises are exempt at all.
5. Conclusion
Sharafat Ali decides three questions in favour of the temple trust. Registration proves status, and a tenant cannot contest it in the eviction suit. Registration also brings the trust within the 1989 notification, so that it need not prove that the income is applied to the trust; the State is taken to have satisfied itself on that before notifying. And a suit may be brought by one trustee holding a resolution of all the trustees.
The reasoning follows binding authority and is internally coherent. Its principal limitation is the gap between registration as a proxy and the statutory condition it stands for, which the judgment leaves to the registration remedy. Its principal practical message is that exemption changes the nature of the dispute from a contest on statutory grounds into a test of notice, status and authority, a test that a prepared institutional landlord will usually pass and an unprepared tenant will usually fail.
Authorities
The following authorities are discussed in the judgment, and the judgment is the source of each description above.
- Sharafat Ali v. Panjikrat Sarvajanik Trust Mandir Murti Shri Murli Manohar Ji (with S.A. Nos. 814 of 2022, 233 of 2021 and 1860 of 2021), Second Appeal No. 953 of 2022, High Court of Madhya Pradesh at Gwalior, judgment dated 5 October 2026, Ashish Shroti J. (source: https://indiankanoon.org/doc/46812285/).
- Scindia Devasthan v. Praveen Kumar Nigam, 2013(4) MPLJ 679 (Division Bench).
- Ram Shankar v. Guru Singh Sabha, 2015(1) MPLJ 667.
- Ramsingh v. Shri Rajiv Lochan Trust, 1975 JLJ 471.
- Indian Council Social Welfare v. State of A.P., (1999) 6 SCC 365.
- Ramgopal v. Balaji Mandir Trust, (2003) 5 SCC 17 (as cited in Ram Shankar).
- Laxman (as cited in Ram Shankar; full citation not given in the judgment).
- Section 3(2), Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act, 1961, and State notification dated 7 September 1989; Section 27, Madhya Pradesh Public Trust Act; Section 106, Transfer of Property Act, 1882.
This article is not legal advice and does not create an attorney–client relationship. Readers should verify the certified copy of the judgment and any subsequent clarificatory orders before relying on it, and consult a qualified advocate on the facts of their matter.