Bombay HC refuses plea seeking injunction order against Tata Trust board meeting

Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Thursday refused urgent hearing on a plea, which sought an injunction order against the May 8 board meeting of the Sir Ratan Tata Trust claiming that the trust was in violation of the provisions of law.

The petition, filed by a 61-year-old Thane resident Suresh Patilkhede, also sought a restraining order on the trustees of the trust from passing or implementing any decision arising out of or connected with its proposed board meeting to be held on Friday.

The plea was mentioned on Thursday before a bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad seeking urgent hearing.

The court, however, refused and said the petitioner was at liberty to move the court's vacation bench.

The high court closes for summer vacation from Saturday.

In his plea, Patilkhede sought directions from the court to reconstitute the trust's board, alleging that the premier public charitable trust was in clear and continuing violation of a 2025 amendment to the Maharashtra Public Trusts Act that caps the number of life trustees.

As per this amendment, if a trust's original documents do not specifically allow permanent or "life trustees", then such trustees cannot make up more than one-fourth of the total board members.

The plea claimed that under the usage and practice of the Trust, out of a total of six trustees, three perpetual trustees (also referred to as life trustees or trustees for life) were appointed between 1989 and 2019.

The petitioner added that, at present, the Trust has six trustees, including Jimmy Naval Tata, Jehangir H C Jehangir, Noel Naval Tata, Venu Srinivasan, Vijay Singh, and senior advocate Darius Khambata.

Of these, three are continuing as life trustees, he claimed, adding that this was "contrary to the mandatory statutory limit" on the number of life trustees.

It further claimed that the proposed meeting was unlawful as the instrument of the trust does not provide for the appointment of life trustees.

"The number of life trustees at any point in time cannot exceed one-fourth of the total number of trustees by virtue of the amendment brought under Section 30A(2) (of the Maharashtra Public Trusts Act)," the plea said.

Patilkhede claimed in the petition that he had emailed the charity commissioner last month but no action was taken pursuant to which he moved the HC.

The plea claimed that "such improper administration of the Trust erodes public confidence", and any decision taken by the present Board is "void and liable to be set aside".

It sought direction to the charity commissioner to ensure statutory compliance.