It was a matter of dispute whether there was a valid Synodical removal of Abdul Messiah from the office of Patriarch.
60 and 61 have to be accepted as proper and valid numberices issued by companypetent persons.
He declared the ex communication of Mar Geevarghese as invalid.
DY pronounced in 1889, which, by a majority of 2 to 1, dismissed the appeal of the defendant Mar Thomas Athanasius and companyfirmed the decree of the lower companyrts in favour of the plaintiff respondent Mar Joseph Dionysius.
By that judgment the Full Bench reversed the judgment and decree of the District Court and directed that the money lying deposited in companyrt be withdrawn by the defendants 5 and 6 and by the person to be thereafter duly elected, appointed and companysecrated as the Malankara Metropolitan.
In 1933 Ephraim was elected as Patriarch of Antioch without, it is said, numberice to the Malabar companymunity.
Metropolitans would ordain Melpattakars in accordance with the Canons of Our Holy Fathers and companysecrate Holy Morone and that the Metropolitan had the sanction and authority to instal a new Catholicos when a Catholicos died.
There was a Civil Misc.
On August 16, 1928 the Managing Committee of the Malankara Association was authorised to drawn up a companystitution for the Church and the Association.
Or had it only been in abeyance for some time?
The arguments companymenced or September 15, 1956 and companycluded in the first week of October 1956 when judgment was reserved.
It is clear from the judgment that in arriving at their companyclusion the learned High Court Judges companypletely overlooked the evidence of D.W. 29 who was the Secretary of Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and who was personally companycerned with the issue of the numberices.
Accordingly Moran Mar Basselios Catholicos, the original first defendant, has preferred this appeal impleading Thukalan Paulo Avira, the original third plaintiff, and Kurian George Semmassen the original seventh defendant, as the respondents, the other parties having died in the companyrse of the long drawn proceeding.
By this Kalpana Abdul Messiah ordained one Mar Poulose Basselios as the first Catholicos and also ordained three Metropolitans.
Do these functions and rights appertain solely to the Patriarch and does the assertion and claim of the 1st defendant to exercise these rights amount to a rejection of the Patriarch?
That suit was, after various proceedings, finally disposed of by the Travancore Royal Court of Final Appeal by its judgment Ex.
This the companygregation declined to do and the meeting ended in companyfusion.
And was it only revived and re established in 1088?
62 and 63 .
The defendants Kora Mathan Malpan, C. J. Kurien and Mar Poulose Athanasius defendants 5, 6 and 42 , appealed to the Travancore High Court.
During the pendency of the Civil Miscellaneous Appeal, hereinbefore mentioned, Mar Geevarghese Dionysius died in February 1934 and the trust properties passed into the possession of Mani Polouse Kathanar and E. J. Joseph.
On March 10, 1938 was filed in the District Court of Kottayam the suit O. S. No.
60 and 61 were issued by proper persons.
1 in the suit out of which this appeal arises and is the appellant before us, was installed by the local Metropolitans as the third Catholicos in terms of the procedure prescribed by the Kalpana Ex.
Have they framed a companystitution for the new church companyferring authority in the Catholicos to companysecrate Morone to ordain the higher orders of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, to issue Stations allocating Dioceses to the Metropolitans and, to companylect Ressissa?
In 1915 Abdulla II and Abdul Messiah died.
1 in the present suit and is number the appellant before us and who was also defendant 3 in O. S. No.
The two rival sets of trustees filed written statement interpleading against each other, the defendants Mar Geevarghese Dionysius, Mani Poulose Kathanar and Kora Kochu Korula being treated as plaintiffs and the defendants Mar Kurilos, Kora Mathan Malpan and C. J. Kurien being treated as defendants.
Have defendants 2 and 3 by helping and actively companyoperating with the 1st defendant in the above acts and pretensions become heretics or aliens to the faith or gone out of the fold? .
The High Court has referred to the evidence of D.Ws.
A. M. , The factum and validity of this meeting are strenuously challenged on diverse grounds to which reference will be made hereafter.
That review application having been dismissed on December 21, 1951, the defendants appealed for and obtained special leave to appeal from this Court under Art, 136 of the Constitution.
LR 1 A .
2 of 1104 was filed in the District Court of Kottayam by 18 persons belonging to what, for the sake of brevity, may be called the Patriarchal party against the defendants 1, 2 and 3 of O. S. No.
Mar Joseph Dionysius asserted that the supremacy of the Patriarch companysisted in companysecrating and appointing Metropolitans from time to time to govern and rule over the Malankara Edavagai, sending Morone the sanctified oil for baptismal purposes, receiving the Ressissa from the companymunity to maintain his dignity and generally in companytrolling the ecclesiastical and temporal affairs of the Edavagai.
60 companyld number vitiate it.
That application for restoration was dismissed on September 29, 1931 Ex.
a Have the plaintiffs and their partisans formed themselves into a separate Church in opposition to Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church?
Indeed in paragraphs 54 and 78 of his judgment in the present suit the District Judge has also definitely found that persons ordained by the Patriarch will have to be accepted by the whole Malankara Church as represented by the Malankara Association and that the Metropolitans on the plaintiffs side had number been so accepted and that, therefore, they companyld number possibly become Vice Presidents and their number joinder in the numberice Ex.
Up to 1905 one Abdul Messiah was the reigning Patriarch of Antioch.
In 1910 Mar Poulose Athanasius the first plaintiff in the present suit and number the respondent in the present appeal arising out of that suit gave an Udampadi and was ordained as a Metropolitan.
At a meeting known as Mattancherry Meeting held in 1654 the Roman Catholic Supremacy was thrown off and the Church in Malabar came under the authority of the Patriarch of Antioch who began to depute Metropolitans for ordaining Metropolitans in Malabar.
The plaintiffs applied for restoration of the suit by setting a side of that order of dismissal.
The finding was that the plaintiff respondent has been so companysecrated and accepted by the majority of the people and had succeeded to the Metropolitanship on the death of Mar Mathew Athanasius.
After his arrival he companyvened a meeting of the Malankara Association at the Old Seminary of Kottayam and demanded that the said Association should accept and acknowledge the temporal authority of the Patriarch.
Exhibit 59 purports to be a numberice issued by the defendant Basselios Catholicos.
Kurien went over to the side of Abdulla II and acknowledged his new numberinee Mar Kurilos as the Malankara Metropolitan and as such the ex officio trustee Mar Geevarghese Dionysius retaliated by companyvening a meeting of the Malankara Association which declared his ex companymunication invalid and removed from trusteeship the two trustees who had gone over to the side of the Patriarch and appointed two new trustees, namely, Mani Poulose Kathanar who was the second appellant but has since died and one Kora Kochu Korula also since deceased.
On August 8, 1946 that appeal was allowed and the suit was decreed by a majority of Judges in the proportion of 2 to 1.
He called a meeting of the accredited representatives of all the churches in Malabar which accepted the ecclesiastical supremacy of the Patriarch of Antioch.
The plaintiffs preferred an appeal to the Travancore High Court, which was numbered as A. S. No, I of 1119.
In 1912 Abdul Messiah, whose Firman had been withdrawn by the Sultan of Turkey, came to Malabar.
94 of 1088 in the District Court of Trivandrum.
A managing companymittee of 24 was to be the standing working companymittee of the said Malankara Association.
Defendants 7 to 41 got themselves impleaded in the suit as defendants and supported defendants 1 to 3.
Have the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Association the Association Committee, and the Churches and people of Malankara also accepted the Catholicate and have submitted themselves to its authority from 1088?
The appeal was then re heard by a Full Bench which by its judgment pronounced on July 4, 1928 Ex.
The meeting was held on August 22, 1935.
As a result of the aforesaid judgment Mar Joseph Dionysius came into possession of the office of the Malankara Metropolitan and of the church properties.
Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and his supporters did number recognise Ephraim as the duly installed Patriarch.
32 of the Constitution by 8 persons belonging to the Catholicos party praying for a writ of certiorari or of the appropriate order or direction or writ for quashing the judgment and decree passed by the High Court of Kerala dated December 31, 1956 in A. S. 1 of 1119.
Shortly thereafter the draft companystitution was published in the shape of a pamphlet.
18 the version of the Canon Law produced by the defendants S. 6 and 42, ii as to the power of the Patriarch to ex communicate without the intervention of the Synod and iii as to the absence of an indirect motive on the part of the Patriarch which induced him to exercise his powers of ex communication must be taken as binding.
16 and companytends that the loss of status as members of the Church by acceptance of the wrong canon is within the scope of those two issues and that the parties to this suit went to trial with that understanding.
The first plaintiff claims to have been elected as the Malankara Metropolitan at a meeting of the Malankara Association held on December 26, 1934 at the M. D. Seminary.
L. R. l16 A .
After these resolutions were passed at the meeting the Civil Miscellaneous Appeal No.
Have they established a new Church styled the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church?
Mar Geevarghese Dionysius declined to submit and give any Udampadi and companysequently in 1911 Abdulla II ex communicate Mar Geeverghese Dionysius whom he himself had ordained in 1907 and ordained one Mar Kurilos as the Malankara Metropolitan so as to make him automatically the ex officio President of the Malankara Association and one of the trustees of the trust properties.
Shortly after this Abdul Messiah left Malabar in March 1913.
94 of 1088 and 12 other persons including the second Catholicos, Mar Geevarghese Philixinos, who may be companypendiously called as belonging to the Catholicos party, and the Secretary of State for India.
That judgment will be found reported in 45 Tr.
DY pronounced on July 12, 1889 quite clearly held that a Metropolitan of the Jacobite Syrian Church should be a native of Malabar companysecrated by the Patriarch or his delegate and accepted by the people as their Metropolitan to entitle him to the spiritual and temporal government of the local church.
23 and 22 and has companycluded that although the numberices Exs.
That appeal before this Court was numbered C. A. 193 of 1952.
Later on the Patriarch himself also ordained Metropolitans for Malankara.
80 issued by Ahdul Messiah and he was substituted as a defendant in O. S. No.
The position at that time, .
74 of 11O7, which was pending in the High Court, was on July 23, 1936 allowed to be dismissed for number prosecution.
The defendants applied for review which came up before the Travancore High Court.
The plaintiffs have brought the suit out of which the present appeal has arisen claiming to be trustees and praying for a declaration of their own title as trustees and for a declaration that the defendants were number trustees and for possession of the trust properties and other incidental reliefs.
Appeal No.
In that suit he impleaded both the sets of rival claimants as defendants, namely, i Mar Geevarghese Dionysius, ii Mani Poulose Kathanar iii Kora Kochu Korula being one set claiming to be trustees and Mar Kurilos, v Kora Mathan Malpan, and vi C. J. Kurien being the other set also making the same claim.
This Kalpana further provided that the Catholicos aided by the.
The meeting also unanimously adopted the companystitution Ex.
2 of 1104 was dismissed for number compliance with the companyrts order for payment of certain moneys to the Commissioner appointed in that suit.
In 1909 Abdulla II came to Malabar with the object of regaining his temporal authority over the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Christian Church.
Are the plaintiffs estopped from companytending that the Catholicate was number validly re established in 1088 or that its authority was number accepted or recognised by the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church?
The companyclusions arrived at by the majority of Judges, as set forth in paragraph 347 of that judgment, were, amongst others, that the ecclesiastical supremacy of the See of Antioch over Jacobite Syrian Church in Travancore had been all along recognised and acknowledged by the Jacobite Syrian Christian Community and their Metropolitans that the exercise of the supreme power companysisted in ordaining either directly or by duly authorised Delegates, Metropolitans from time to time to manage the spiritual matters of the local Church, in sending Morone to be used in the churches for baptismal and other purposes and in general supervision over the spiritual government of the Church that the authority of the Patriarch had never extended to the government of temporalities of the Church which, in this respect, had been an independent Church that the Metropolitan of the Jacobite Syrian Church in Travancore should be a native of Malabar companysecrated by the patriarch or by his duly authorised Delegate and accepted by the people as their Metropolitan.
256 , upheld the decision of the learned District Judge and companyfirmed his decree.
In 1909 Mar Joseph Dionysius died and the Malankara Association elected and installed one Mar Geevarghese Dionysius who, in 1907, had gone to Syria and got himself ordained as a Metropolitan by Patriarch Abdulla II as the Malankara Metropolitan and as such he became the ex officio President of the Malankara Association and one of the trustees of the Church properties.
On August 21, 1928 O. S. No.
255 the trial companyrt upheld the claim of defendants Mar Geevarghese Dionysius, Mani Poulose Kathanar and Kora Kochu Korula defendants 1 to 3 as the lawful trustees of the Church properties.
a Have the 1st defendant and his partisans voluntarily given up their allegiance to and seceded from the Ancient Jacobite Syrian Church?
The other two companytrustees of Mar Joseph Dionysius, namely, Kora Mathan Malpan and C. J. Kurien companytinued as companyrustees of MarGee varghese Dionysius.
therefore, was that there were two rival groups in the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church who were represented by two rival sets of trustees, namely, Mar Geevarghese Dionysius since deceased and his companytrustees Mani Poulose Kathanar the second appellant number deceased and Kora Kochu Korula also since deceased on the one side and Mar Murilos and Kora Mathan Malpan and J. Kurien who had deserted Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and had sided with Mar Kurilos.
133 of the Constitution.
2 of l104 in place and stead of the second Catholicos mar Geevarghese Philixinos.
Have they forfeited their right to be beneficiaries in respect of the trust properties belonging to the Malankara Jacobite Syrian companymunity?
In Malabar there is a Christian companymunity companymonly known as Malankara Jacobite Syrian Christians.
A.M, was number referred to therein as a ground for such exclusion.
2 of l104 was unanimously elected as Malankara Metropolitan and as such he automatically became a trustee of the church properties.
In the meantime in 1913 the Secretary of State for India filed an inter pleader suit O. S. No.
The High Court on March 2l, 1957 granted a certificate under Art.
On December 3, 1934 three numberices Exs.
The M. D. Seminary meeting was companyvened by numberices issued individually to all the Jacobite Syrian Christian Churches in Malabar.
In 1913 he issued a Kalpana Ex.
On March 4, 1879 one Mar Joseph Dionysius claiming to be the properly companysecrated Metropolitan of the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church and the President of the Malankara Association filed a suit O. S. No.
By its judgment delivered on May 21, 1954, Mar Basselios Catholicos v. Mar Poulose Athanasious, 1954 Ker LT 385 1955 1 SCR 520 1954 AIR SC 526 B , this Court allowed the appeal, set aside the judgment of the High Court and admitted the review application and directed the entire appeal No.
255 pronounced on September 15, 1919, the suit was companyverted into a representative action on behalf of the Jacobite Syrian Christian population of Malabar with the permission of the companyrt and numberice was, given of the institution of the suit under S. 26 of the Travancore Civil Procedure Code by publishing advertisements in the several jurisdictions peopled by the Syrian Christian companymunity.
The said representatives met together in a Synod called the Mulunthuruthu Synod under the presidentship of Patriarch Peter III.
The judgment of the Travancore Royal Court of Final Appeal Ex.
As will appear from paragraph 3 of the trial companyrts judgment Ex.
Did Mar Geevarghese Dionysius submit himself to the authority of the Catholicate from 1088 till his death?
61 had been issued by the members of the Managing Committee, the High Court points out that in the absence of specific rules as to who can issue the numberices, Exs.
The other two trustees Kora Mathan Malpan and CJ.
439 of 1054 in the Zilla Court of Alleppey against one Mar Thomas Athanasius who claimed to have been ordained by his brother Mar Mathew Athanasius as is successor and two other persons who claimed to be the Kathanar an lay trustees for the recovery of the church properties.
The proceedings of that meeting were recorded in writing, a companyy of which is marked Ex.
On January 23 1931 O. S. No.
In 1876 Patriarch Peter III came to Malabar.
That application has also companye up for hearing along with the appeal.
Abdulla II left Malabar in October 1911 and in 1912 issued a Kalpana message or order branding Abdul Messiah and Mar Geevarghese Dionysius as wolves from whom the faithful should entirely keep aloof.
Abdulla II thereafter started approaching the parish churches separately and attempted to get from them Udampadis Submission Deeds acknowledging the spiritual and tempor supremacy of the Patriarch.
We do number companysider this argument to be well founded at all.
60 had been issued by three Metropolitans as Vice Presidents and Ex.
111 of 1113 out of which the present appeal has arisen for various reliefs to which reference will hereafter be made in some detail.
The plaintiffs in this suit base their title to trusteeship on their election at a meeting of the churches alleged to have been held on August 22, 1935 at Karingasserai when the original plaintiff is said to have been elected the Malankara Metropolitan and the plaintiffs 2 and 3 as Kathanar and lay trustees.
That suit was dismissed on January 18, 1943.
There is number dispute however, that the Sultan of Turkey had withdrawn the Firman he had issued recognising Abdul Messiah as the Patriarch and had issued a fresh Firman in favour of one Abdulla II who began to perform the duties of the Patriarch.
The said meeting also resolved to enquire into the real position of Abdulla II and Abdul Messiah and suspend the payment of Ressissa to the Patriarch.
The ner result of that litigation, therefore, was that Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and his two companytrustees defendants 1, 2 and 3 became finally entitled to withdraw the moneys deposited in the companyrt as the lawful trustees of the church properties.
The Travanecore High Court thereupon took up the re hearing of the appeal.
There is number substance in this companytention.
Shri T. N. Subramania Aiyer took a preliminary objection as to the maintainability of the appeal on the ground that although the final judgment of the Kerala High Court was passed on December 13, 1956 it only restored the decree of the majority of the Travancore High Court pronounced on August 8, 1946 and accordingly, that being a decree passed before the companymencement of the Constitution, number appeal would lie under Art.
But on the question as to whether the numberices had been issued and served on all the churches, the High Court has observed that there was number reliable and companyvincing evidence in proof of that fact.
It may be mentioned here that in 1929 on the death of Mar Geevarghese Philixinos, Moran Mar Basselios, who was defendant No.
Is the Patriarch alone entitled to and companypetent to companysecrate Morone for use in the Malankara Church?
255 pronounced by the trial companyrt on September 15, 1919 in the interpleader suit O. S. No.
There is number averment anywhere in the pleadings that by accepting the Hudaya canon companypiled by Bar Hebreus Ex.
The prayer was for the determination of the question as to which of the two rival sets of trustees was entitled to draw the interest on the amounts standing to the credit of the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Christian companymunity in the British treasury.
The learned Judges of the High Court held that the Catholicos, even if validly appointed, had been assigned number place in the Malankara Association or in the Managing Committee as its member or President and companysequently companyld number be said to be companypetent to issue such a numberice as Ex.
He started rewarding persons who gave Udampadis by ordaining them as Metropolitans , and ex communicating those who declined to do so.
The plaintiffs impute certain acts and companyduct to the defendants and companytend that by reason thereof the defendants have become heretics or aliens or have gone out of the Church.
74 of l107 against the order refusing to restore the suit.
On the very next day Mar Julius Elias, the Patriarchs Delegate who was in Malabar at that time and who has figured as P.W. 17 in the present proceedings, issued an order on Mar Geevarghese Dionysius calling upon him to execute an Udampadi within two days and at the same time suspending him for having companymitted several grave offences against the Holy Throne of Antioch and the faith and practices of the Holy Church and repudiated the authority of the ruling Patriarch .
It companysisted of the Malankara Metropolitan as the ex officio President and three representatives from each church.
That application was admitted subject to the companydition that on the re hearing the findings recorded i as to the authenticity of Ex.
DZ which will be found reported in 41 Trav.
Kora Kochu Korula who was one of the companytrustees of Mar Geevarghese Dionysius died in 1931 and one E. J. Joseph was appointed a trustee in his place and stead.
255 pronounced by the trial judge in 1919 and reported in 41 Trav LR1 A , however, summarises the pleadings and the rival companytentions of the two opposing sets of trustees who interpleaded against each other.
In view of the disputes raging between the two sections of the companymunity which resulted in acute dissensions in the Church, an attempt was made to restore good will and amity amongst the members of the companymunity and at the instance of Lord Irwin, the then Viceroy of India, Patriarch Elias I visited Malabar in 1931.
He however, died in Malabar before he companyld effect any settlement.
Has the institution of the Catholicate for the East exercising jurisdiction over Malankara ever existed at any time before 1088?
Was the institution of the Catholicate for the East with jurisdiction in Malankara, purported to be brought into existence in 1088 for the first time?
ii and ii a Same remarks apply to these two grounds formulated above.
He actually succeeded in getting such Udampadis from some of the churches but number from many.
A reference to the pleadings will indicate how and why the Hoodaya canon came to be pleaded and discussed in this case.
Mar Thomas Athanasius totally denied such alleged supremacy of the Patriarch.
59, 60 and 61 were issued companyvening a meeting of the Churches to be held on December 26, 1934 at M. D. Seminary at Kottayam for, inter alia electing the Malankara Metropolitan and adopting the draft companystitution.
Notices were also published in two leading Malayalam newspapers Exs.
According to him the Patriarch companyld number claim, as a matter of right, to have any companytrol over the Jacobite Syrian Church in Malabar either in temporal or spiritual matters, although, as a high dignitary in the churches of the companyntry where their Saviour was born and crucified, the Malabar Syrian Christian companymunity did venerate the Patriarch.
At that meeting Mar Poulose Athanasius, the original first plaintiff in the present suit number deceased, was elected Malankara Metropolitan, Mar Poulose Kathanar and E. Joseph, the defendants 2 and 3 in the present suit were removed from trusteeship and Avira Joseph Kathanar and Thukalan Paulo Avira, plaintiffs 2 and 3 in the present suit, plaintiff No.
2 having died since, were elected trustees and the three new trustees Plaintiffs 1 to 3 in the present suit were authorised to file a suit for the recovery of the trust properties.
On July 5, 1935 the Metropolitans of the Patriarchal party issued a numberice Ex.
D summoning a meeting of the Church representatives for August 22, 1935 at Karingasserai to elect the Malankara Metropolitan.
After pointing out that Ex.
By the aforesaid judgment Ex.
During the pendency of the suit, defendant 4, Mar Kurilos died and Mar Poulose Athanasius, who claimed to be the successor of mar Kurilos as Malankara Metropolitan, was added as defendant No.
Learned companynsel for the respondents urges that the High Court overlooked the fact that Ex.
In 1923 the Full Bench of the Travancore High Court pronounced its judgment Ex.
In December 1956 the same Judges heard the appeal formally de numbera by putting a few questions and on December 13, 1956 delivered a unanimous judgment allowing the appeal and decreeing the suit.
On November 1, 1956 came the States Reorganisation Act which brought into being the present State of Kerala and the Kerala High Court.
He also sent letters to the Governments of Travancore and Madras to withheld the payment of interest to defendant Mar Geevarghese Dionysius on the ground of his suspension.
60 was number issued by all the Vice Presidents, because the Metropolitans on the plaintiffs side who were also Vice Presidents did number join in issuing the numberice Ex.
Shortly put, the third Catholicos, who was defendant No.
The meeting was held on the appointed day and the proceedings of that meeting will be found recorded in Ex.
Was such a re establishment effected by Abdul Messiah with the company operation of the late Malankara Metropolitan Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and the other Metropolitans of Malankara and the Malankara Church?
Mar Geevarghese Dionysius and his two companytrustees defendants 1, 2 and 3 applied under S. 12 of the Travancore High Court Regulation 1099 for review of the aforesaid judgment of the Full Bench.
Was Abdul Messiah companypetent to do so?
A. S. 1 of 1119 to be re heard on all points.
F. o. At that Synod the Malankara Syrian Christian Association, popularly called the Malankara Association, was formed to manage all the affairs of the churches and the companymunity.
In the meantime on April 17, 1957 was filed a petition under Art.
