The managing committee of the Gyanvapi mosque in Uttar Pradesh’s Varanasi has moved the Supreme Court against the petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Places of Worship Act, saying that the consequences sought by it were “bound to be drastic”, Live Law reported on Friday.
The Places of Worship Act, 1991, does not allow the religious character of a place of worship in India, as it existed on August 15, 1947, to be changed. The only exception to the law was the site of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, where a Ram temple is now being built following a Supreme Court judgement.
In 2020, a lead petition was filed challenging the Act. A year later, the court issued notice to the Union government on the petition. Subsequently, several similar pleas were filed against the statute.
In an intervention application on these petitions, the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee, which takes care of the Gyanvapi mosque, noted that it was a key stakeholder in the legal deliberation on the Act, Live Law reported.
In August 2023, an order of a Supreme Court bench headed by DY Chandrachud, who was the chief justice at the time, permitted a survey to be carried out at the mosque to examine whether the religious structure was built on a temple.
While hearing the matter in 2022, Chandrachud also maintained that ascertaining the religious character of a place of worship was not barred under the Places of Worship Act. The court is yet to hear the challenge mounted to the Gyanvapi survey on the basis of the Act.
Chandrachud retired as the chief justice on November 10.
The managing committee, in its intervention application, said that several suits had been filed demanding the removal of the mosque despite the prohibitions under Section 3 and Section 4 of the Act, according to Live Law.
While Section 3 prohibits the conversion of a place of worship from one religious denomination to another, Section 4 mandates that any pending legal proceedings related to the conversion of a place of worship’s religious character before August 15, 1947, will be terminated.
Twenty civil suits have been filed in the Varanasi district court so far seeking to overturn the protection granted to the Gyanvapi mosque under the Places of Worship Act, and have it removed, Live Law reported.
The Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee said that the applications filed seeking to remove the mosque, along with similar petitions registered against other mosques and dargahs in the country, were being done due to a misinterpretation of the Places of Worship Act.
“In the past few years, a number of claims have already been made with regard to various mosques/dargahs claiming them to be ancient temples,” The Indian Express quoted the committee as having said.
The claims were “rhetorical and communal”, the committee added.
It also referred to a court in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal allowing an application on November 19 asking for Hindus to be given access to and survey the Shahi Jama Masjid in Chandausi town.
The petitioners claimed that the mosque had been built in 1526 by Mughal ruler Babar on the site of the “centuries old Shri Hari Har Temple dedicated to Lord Kalki”. Five persons were killed in violence during protests against the survey of the mosque on November 24.
“As seen recently in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh where a court permitted survey of the Shahi Jama Masjid by allowing an application for appointment of Survey Commissioner the very day when the suit was presented, in ex parte proceedings, the incident led to widespread violence...,” the intervention application said.
It added: “The declaration sought by the petitioner would mean such disputes rising their head in every nook and corner of the country and ultimately obliterate the rule of law and communal harmony.”
Opposition leaders have claimed that Chandrachud’s remarks in 2022 stating that the determination of the religious character of a place of worship was not barred under the Places of Worship Act had opened a “Pandora’s box”.
They also alleged that the law was being “violated brazenly” by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
On November 27, a Rajasthan court also admitted a petition claiming that the shrine of 13th-century Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti in Ajmer was built over a Shiva temple.
Also read: How SC’s evasion on Places of Worship Act challenge is powering new Hindutva claims on mosques
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