The Madras High Court on Friday appointed two of its retired judges as the Committee of Administrators to administer the Church of South India (CSI) as well as the CSI Trust Association until the conduct of fresh elections for the Diocesan Councils and the Synod.
A Division Bench of Justices R. Subramanian and R. Sakthivel appointed former judges R. Balasubramanian and V. Bharathidasan as administrators and said that the latter shall take charge of the administration of CSI and CSI Trust Association with immediate effect.
The Bench gave liberty to the administrators to appoint any retired district judge/judges to assist them in the process of administering the two institutions and conducting elections first to the Diocesan Councils and then to the Synod from among those nominated by the councils.
It was made clear that the CSI Synod must pay an initial remuneration of ₹10 lakh each to the two retired High Court judges appointed to the Committee of Administrators and an initial remuneration of ₹3 lakh each to the retired district judges, if any of them get appointed by the administrators.
The orders were passed while allowing a batch of original side appeals filed in 2023 against a single judge’s order. Authoring the order for the Bench, Justice Subramanian said, CSI was an unregistered body of persons which was in charge of the functions of protestant churches in south India and Sri Lanka.
CSI came into existence on September 27, 1947 and was governed by a set of rules named the Constitution of CSI. Disputes often arise regarding the management and conduct of elections for the posts of various office-bearers in CSI as well as CSI Trust Association, which was a company registered under the Companies Act, 1956.
While CSI looks after the ecclesiastical functions, the CSI Trust Association takes care of the administration of the properties of the church. Holding that the last elections stand vitiated in view of the electoral college itself being defective, the judges appointed a Committee of Administrators to conduct fresh elections at the earliest and also to administer the two institutions till then.
