Section 40. Continuance of legal proceeding by or against erstwhile public trust and construction of reference to that trust.

(1) Where the erstwhile trust or any trustee or Committee thereof was, immediately before the appointed day, a party to any legal proceedings with respect to any property, rights, liabilities or obligations since vested in the reconstituted Devasthan Trust under section 3, by the name of the erstwhile trust, the said reconstituted Devasthan Trust or its Committee, shall be deemed to have been substituted for the erstwhile trust or its trustees or Committee, as a party to those proceedings, or added as a party thereto, as the case may be, and the proceedings shall continue accordingly. (2) Any reference to the erstwhile trust or its trustees or Committee in any law for the time being in force or in any rule, regulations, notification or order issued thereunder, or in any instrument or other document shall, on and after the appointed day, or the date of commencement of this Act, as the case may be, unless the context otherwise requires, be construed as a reference to the Devasthan Trust, as reconstituted under section 3 or its Committee, as the case may be.