History of the Parsis : including their manners, customs, religion and present position : with coloured and other illustrations : in two volumes

CHAP. V.] PARSI CHARITABLE FUNDS. 241

recourse to a criminal court for defamation of character.

The Panchayet is therefore, strictly speaking, powerless for either good or evil, and performs no other functions than those of trustee to certain charitable funds of the community.

For the purpose of securing the better management and administration of their religious and charitable funds and property the members of the old Parsi Panchayet in the year 1823 selected from amongst themselves four leading gentlemen as trusteesnamely, Hormasji Bamanji Wadia, Framji Kavasji Banaji, Naorozji Jamshedji Wadia, and Jamshedji Jijibhai. In that year the funds and property consisted of Rs.20,000 in cash, including one sicca loan for Rs.2,000, the compound of the towers of silence, with some land at Chaupati, and a “nasakhana,” or house for corpse-bearers, in the fort. But after the appointment of the trustees the funds and landed properties were gradually increased by contributions from different benevolent Parsi gentlemen. The said trustees and their successors regularly published, and are still publishing every year, a full and detailed account of all the receipts and disbursements relating to the funds and landed property under their control. It is a noteworthy fact that the funds which in the beginning amounted to the insignificant sum of Rs.20,000 have now increased to the very

VOL. I. R