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For the purposes of this section any property comprised in a Hindu, Muhamrnacian or Buddhist religious or charitable endowment shall be deemed to be property vested in trust for a specific purpose, and the manager of any such property snail be deemed to be the trustee thereof."

The contention of the defendants in the lower courts as well as before us, is that Section 10 saved only suits against an express trustee and not a trustee 'De Son Tort* or constructive trustee; Balakrishnaiah was never an express trustee; His possession was that of a mere trustee 'De Son Tort' or constructive trustee and hence this special provision of the Limitation Act has no application. Plaintiffs' learned advocate endeavoured to meet this plea by reference to some decisions which make no distinction between the two categories of trustees and hold that Section 10 is equally applicable to all trustees whether express or constructive,

His Lordship, however, recognised that the expression 'De Facto' trustee' is not to be found in the leading English cases and that, instead, the words used are: "trustee 'De Son Tort' or constructive trustee", the two expressions being interchangeable. He defines a trustee 'De Son Tort' as "a person who by a mistake or otherwise bona fide assumes the character of trustee, though it does not really belong to him." I doubt whether the expression has necessarily to be confined to bona fide assumption of the office as a trustee. The question of Bona fides is immaterial, so long as the trustee enters on the management unlawfully, What distinguishes him from an express trustee is the unlawful nature of his management and not the dishonesty of his impressions. "De son tort" means "of bis own wrong". A wrong does not lose its character as a wrong merely because it is believed by the wrong-doer to be proper. The mental attitude has no significance. It is the objective situation that matters. Raghavarao, J., in the aforesaid case regards the two expressions as synonymous.

18. The learned Chief Justice, while indicating the literal meaning of the two expressions, 'De Facto' as standing for "by the title of possession" and 'De Jure' by the title of right" expressed that the category would comprise of "a person other than a manager or the head of an institution who could establish a legal title to his office."

19. For the purposes of the present case nothing turns, on the difference or identity of meaning and connotation in regard to the two expressions 'trustee de facto' and 'trustee de son tort'. While the former refers to the criterion of actual possession and management as the distinguishing feature, the latter emphasises the unlawful and wrongful nature of the assumption of trusteeship, while the cognate expression 'constructive' referring to such a trustee stresses the mode in which management was taken up, in the absence of an express appointment as a trustee to the office in any document or through other overt expression of intention of the founder of the trust.