How to File a Change Report Under Section 22 of the Maharashtra Public Trusts Act

Vikrant D. Shetty

Aug 13

8 min read

Updated: Aug 26

One of the major points of compliance for Public Trusts are filing Change Reports and getting them approved from the office of the Charity Commissioner. Trustees resign, die, or get added; a trust buys or sells immovable property; an address changes; a trust deed gets amended in ways that ripple through what is recorded on the public register. Each of these events triggers a statutory obligation that is easy to overlook until a bank, a title search, or a dispute exposes the gap: the change report required under Section 22 of the Maharashtra Public Trusts Act, 1950 (the "Act"), formerly the Bombay Public Trusts Act, 1950.

What Counts as a "Change" Requiring Report Under Section 22

Section 22(1) casts a wide net. It applies whenever "any change occurs in any of the entries recorded in the register kept under Section 17." Read that carefully: the obligation is defined not by what happened to the trust but by what is written in the register itself. Once a fact on the register (the names of trustees, the trust's address, the description of trust property, the mode of succession, or the terms affecting the register entries) stops matching reality, a report is due.

Change of Trustees and the Vahiwatdar Question

The most common trigger is a change in trustees, whether by resignation, death, removal, retirement, or fresh appointment. In many Maharashtra trusts, particularly religious and quasi-religious institutions, the person managing the trust is referred to as the vahiwatdar, and succession to that office can be a matter of hereditary right or a scheme laid down in the trust deed. Filing (or failing to file) a change report does not itself decide who holds that office; it records a change that has already taken effect under the trust's own governing instrument or applicable law.

Changes to Trust Property and Schedule III-A

A distinct category concerns immovable trust property: acquisition, sale, mortgage, or any transaction affecting property already entered in the register. These changes are reported on Schedule III-A rather than the general Schedule III form, and they typically draw closer scrutiny because they touch title and third-party interests. Supporting title documents, valuation, and, where relevant, prior sanction under Section 36 for alienation of trust property are usually called for at this stage.

The Ninety-Day Clock and When It Can Be Extended

Computing the Limitation Period

Under Section 22(1), the trustee must report the change to the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner within ninety days from the date the change occurs, not from the date it is discovered or documented. For a trustee's death, that is the date of death; for a resignation, the date it takes effect under the trust deed or, absent a specified date, the date of acceptance by the remaining trustees. Miscalculating this starting point is one of the more frequent errors in practice, since trustees often count from the date of a board resolution rather than the underlying event.

Condonation for Sufficient Cause After the 2017 Amendment

Before the 2017 amendment, the ninety-day period had no built-in flexibility. Late reports were routinely accompanied by informal explanations that had no clear statutory footing, and the authority had no clean way to accept them. The amendment fixed that by inserting a proviso empowering the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner to condone delay on sufficient cause being shown, subject to payment of costs credited to the Public Trust Administration Fund. That does not make the deadline optional. It gives the authority discretion to accept a late report rather than treat every delay as incurable, provided the explanation is genuine and, where directed, the costs are paid.

Filing the Change Report: Form, Forum and Supporting Documents

Which Form to Use

General changes, principally to trustees, addresses, or the mode of succession, are reported in Schedule III. Changes involving immovable property use Schedule III-A. The report is filed with the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner having jurisdiction over the region in which the trust is registered, and under the rules framed in 2019, online filing through the Charity Commissioner's portal is now available alongside physical submission.

Documents the Deputy Charity Commissioner Will Insist On

Rule 13(2A) of the Bombay Public Trusts Rules, 1951 sets out the supporting material expected with a change report: a certified copy of the resolution recording the change, consent letters from incoming trustees along with their addresses and contact details, death certificates or resignation letters as applicable, and, for property changes, the underlying conveyance, sale deed, or mortgage document. A report filed without these papers is routinely returned or kept pending, which in practice extends the effective timeline well beyond ninety days even where the report itself was filed on time.

Stage	Who Acts	Typical Timeframe
Filing of change report (Schedule III / III-A)	Trustee	Within 90 days of the change (extendable for sufficient cause)
Provisional acceptance (uncontested trustee/manager changes)	Deputy/Assistant Charity Commissioner	Within 15 working days of filing
Objection window after provisional acceptance	Public / interested parties	30 days from publication
Full inquiry (if objections are raised)	Deputy/Assistant Charity Commissioner	To be completed within 3 months of commencement
Outer limit for completion of enquiry (post-2024 amendment)	Deputy/Assistant Charity Commissioner	Within 1 year of initiating the enquiry, with reasons recorded if exceeded

The Inquiry Under Section 22(4) and (5)

Provisional Acceptance and the Thirty-Day Objection Window

The 2017 amendment also introduced a faster route for uncontested changes to trustees or managers. The Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner may pass a provisional order accepting the change within fifteen working days of the report being filed, following which the change is published (now typically on the Charity Commissioner's website rather than a physical notice board) and thirty days are allowed for objections. If nobody objects, the provisional order becomes final without a contested hearing. Where an objection is filed, or where the change involves property under Schedule III-A, the matter proceeds to a full inquiry under Section 22(4), at which the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner records evidence, hears the parties, and passes a reasoned order under Section 22(5).

The One-Year Outer Limit Introduced in 2024

Backlogs in change report inquiries have long been a documented complaint among practitioners dealing with the Charity Commissioner's office, with some regions reporting reports pending for several years. The 2024 amendment to the Act addressed this directly by requiring that, once an inquiry under Section 22(4) is initiated, it be completed within one year, and that reasons be recorded where the authority is unable to meet that deadline. Whether this outer limit meaningfully compresses actual disposal times in practice remains to be seen, but it gives an aggrieved trustee or objector a concrete benchmark against which delay can be measured and, if necessary, challenged.

What a Change Report Does and Does Not Establish

Registration Is Not Adjudication of Title

An order accepting a change report updates the public register; it is not, by itself, a judicial determination of disputed rights such as title to property or a contested claim to the office of trustee. Where a change is genuinely contentious, for instance where rival claimants each assert entitlement to act as trustee, the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner's inquiry under Section 22 resolves what should be entered in the register for administrative purposes, but a party who disputes the underlying entitlement retains recourse to a civil suit or other proceedings where that question can be adjudicated on full evidence. This distinction was underscored by the Supreme Court in Shri Mallikarjun Devasthan, Shelgi v. Subhash Mallikarjun Birajdar [2024 INSC 339], where the Court held that delay in filing a change report does not, by itself, invalidate an otherwise lawful assumption of office by a vahiwatdar; the failure to report within time attracts the penal consequences prescribed under the Act, but it does not retroactively unwind a succession that has already taken effect under the trust's own rules.

Interplay with Section 22A and Independent Proceedings

Section 22A provides a separate route where a change concerns the mode of succession or a change to the constitution or governing scheme itself, rather than a change already effected under the existing terms of the trust. The two provisions are not interchangeable: Section 22 records changes that have occurred; Section 22A addresses applications for change in the mode of appointment or succession going forward. Trustees sometimes conflate the two, filing a Section 22 change report where the underlying alteration properly requires a Section 22A application, which can stall the inquiry until the correct procedure is followed. Separately, the Bombay High Court has clarified that action against a trustee for suspension, removal, or dismissal under Section 41-D is independent of a pending Section 22 inquiry into that trustee's own change report; the Charity Commissioner is not obliged to await the outcome of one before proceeding with the other.

Where a trust itself was constituted under the terms of a will, questions about who is entitled to act as trustee can also intersect with the probate of that underlying will, since an executor's authority and a trustee's succession are governed by related but distinct bodies of law.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is responsible for filing a change report, and can more than one trustee file it?

The Act places the obligation on "the trustee," and in practice any trustee, or a person authorised on the trust's behalf, may file the report. Where trustees disagree about a change, more than one party may end up filing competing reports, which is typically what converts a routine filing into a contested inquiry.

What happens if no change report is filed at all?

Failure to report attracts penal consequences under Section 66 of the Act, and the register continues to show outdated information, which can cause difficulties in banking transactions, property dealings, and any situation where a third party relies on the register to verify who currently holds office as trustee.

Does filing a change report validate a trustee's appointment if the appointment itself is disputed?

No. The change report and the order accepting it update the register; they do not conclusively determine a disputed question of entitlement to office. A party who disputes the appointment may still pursue a civil remedy, and the Supreme Court's observations in the Mallikarjun Devasthan decision are consistent with this limited administrative function of Section 22.

Can a change report be filed after the ninety-day period has expired?

Yes, subject to the Deputy or Assistant Charity Commissioner being satisfied that sufficient cause exists for the delay, and generally on payment of costs directed to be credited to the Public Trust Administration Fund. There is no absolute bar on a late filing, but the explanation for the delay needs to be genuine and specific to the facts.

Is a separate application needed for a change in trust property, or does the change report cover it?

Property changes are reported through Schedule III-A as part of the change report mechanism, but where the transaction itself requires prior sanction, such as alienation of immovable trust property under Section 36, that sanction is a separate and prior requirement; the Schedule III-A report records the transaction after the necessary approvals are in place.

How is a change report different from an application under Section 22A?

A change report under Section 22 records a change that has already taken place under the trust's existing terms. An application under Section 22A is used where the trust seeks to alter the mode of succession or the manner of appointing trustees going forward. Filing the wrong one for the situation is a common source of delay.

What documents should accompany the change report to avoid it being kept pending?

At minimum, the resolution recording the change, consent letters and contact details of any incoming trustees, and death certificates, resignation letters, or title documents as applicable to the specific change. Property-related reports additionally require the underlying conveyance or transfer document. Incomplete filings are the most common reason inquiries stall well beyond the statutory timeframes.