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Present at the Hearing. Lord Blanesburgh. Lord Tomlin. Sir Lancelot Sanderson. (Delivered by Lord Blanesburgh.)
At Shirpur, in the District of Akola, there has stood for five hundred years and it may be for much longer, the Jain Temple of Antariksha Parasnath. The Jains are roughly ranged into two main divisions- the Digambaris, represented in this suit by the appellants and the Swetambaris represented by the respondents. One of the essential religious differences between the two is that Digambari idols are worshipped in a state of complete nudity, while the idols of the Swetambaris are revered draped and decorated with jewellery and ornaments. This deep-seated doctrinal or liturgical difference between these influential sections of the Jain community lies at the root of the dispute which has ripened into this portentious litigation.
In the temple at Shirpur there is an ancient idol, ""Shri Antariksha Parasnath Maharaj," believed by the Swetambaris to be self-existent. The deity is held in deep veneration by them, also by the Digambaris. It has apparently been a subject of controversy time out of mind whether it is a Swetambari or a Digambari idol, and whether as originally existent it was covered at the waist by a tie or band carved out of the stone or sand of which it is composed as the Swetambaris assert-or whether, it being apparently agreed that the private parts are not visible to the worshipper, this resulted not from any tie or band or other physical covering but from the actual posture of the idol itself, as is the contention of the Digambaris, the Swetambaris used from time to time to plaster the idol's body as a result of which that which was alleged by them to be a self-existent waist band had in the Digambari view been produced and the immediate occasion of the suit was that on the 13th February. 1908, the defendants 1 to 7, with other Digambaris acting in the interest of the sect chiselled, as the plaintiffs alleged, by means of iron instruments, the alleged self-existent tie and waistband from the body of the idol and removed the plaster and erased the lines on its hands and ears, outraging thereby the religious feeling of the Swetambaris. For all this the plaintiffs claimed Rs. 15,003 as damages. But the scope of the suit was not limited to that claim. It became the medium for vindicating Swetambari pretensions ranging for beyond its immediate occasion. By their plaint the plaintiffs asserted that the property and right of management of the entire temple was and always had been exclusively in the Swetambaris. On that footing they claimed substantive | 30
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