A Varanasi court on Tuesday fixed February 15 for the hearing of a petition seeking a survey of all closed cellars of the basement in the Gyanvapi mosque complex by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI).
According to the petition, there are “secret cellars” inside the basements and it is necessary to survey them to reveal the entire truth of the Gyanvapi mosque, which Hindus claimed was built on the remains of a pre-existing temple.
The counsel for the Hindu side, Madan Mohan Yadav, said acting District Judge Anil Kumar has fixed February 15 as the next date of hearing on the petition.
He said that on the petition of Rakhi Singh, lawyers said that there are eight basements in the Gyanvapi complex which have not been surveyed earlier.
He claimed that the high court had earlier ordered in a 1991 case that the remaining survey be conducted.
The lawyers for the Gyanvapi mosque management committee expressed their objection to the demand for a survey and said that there was no such order of the high court.
There is no basis to order a survey of the remaining basements, they said.
After hearing both sides, the district court gave the next date.
The petitioner, Rakhi Singh, is a founding member of the Vishwa Vedic Sanatan Sangh and is one of the parties in the Maa Shringar Gauri case, which led to the survey of the complex by the ASI.
In the petition, she asked for all closed cellars in the Gyanvapi mosque complex, adjacent to the Kashi Vishwanath temple, to be surveyed by the ASI, her advocate Anupam Dwivedi said. A map of the closed basements has also been included in the petition.
Last Friday, the Allahabad High Court refused to grant an interim stay on the Varanasi court order that allowed Hindu prayers before idols in ‘Vyas Ji ka Tehkhana’– a cellar in the basement of Gyanvapi mosque. The court said that unless the January 17 order is challenged, nothing can be done. Justice Rohit Ranjan Agrawal passed the order while hearing an appeal filed by the committee.
Days after Hindu prayers were at the southern cellar of the Gyanvapi Masjid for the first time in three decades a day after a local court gave the go-ahead for it at the 17th-century mosque complex, the Hindu side on Monday filed a fresh plea in the court demanding ASI survey of the rest of the basements in the mosque premises.
LATEST UPDATES IN GYANVAPI ROW
- The petitioner, Rakhi Singh, filed the application seeking an ASI survey of the blocked cellars in the basement in the lower court of Varanasi. The application said that the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) should conduct the study after removing the blocked entrance and debris.
- In the petition, Singh has claimed some of the basements inside the mosque were not surveyed as their entrances were blocked. Hence, ASI be directed to survey the cellars without causing any damage to the structure, the petition said.
- After the Allahabad High Court refused to put a stay on the Varanasi court’s order allowing Hindu prayers inside the mosque complex, the Muslim side said, “Proof should be above faith for court.”
- The Varanasi court ruled that a Hindu priest can perform prayers before the idols in the southern cellar of the Gyanvapi mosque.
- The mosque committee on Thursday moved the high court within hours of the Supreme Court refusing to hear its plea against the Varanasi district court’s order and asking it to approach the Allahabad High Court.
- The counsel for the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee, SFA Naqvi, said they have requested an urgent hearing in the matter.
- In the appeal filed before the high court, it has been pleaded that the Hindu side’s suit itself is barred by order 7 rule 11 of the Civil Procedure Code, Naqvi said.
- The plea has also alleged that the main purpose behind filing the suit was to create a controversy over the functional Gyanvapi mosque where regular namaz is offered. A caveat was also filed by the Hindu side regarding the matter.
- The Varanasi district court arrived at the decision of allowing ‘puja’ in a Gyanvapi mosque cellar in “haste”, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) said Friday, asserting it would pursue the matter right up to the Supreme Court.
- The Muslim side has also filed a plea in district court seeking a stay for 15 days on puja inside the basement
- Meanwhile, the Hindu side has filed a caveat, seeking that it should be heard before the court passes any order.
- Shailendra Kumar Pathak, who had petitioned the Varanasi district court seeking the right to worship there, had claimed that his grandfather, Somnath Vyas, offered “puja” there up to December 1993, when it was stopped by the administration.
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