SC notice to Centre on plea to open Kashi, Mathura temple disputes

Satya Prakash

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Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 12

Sixteen months after paving the way for the construction of Ram Temple at Ayodhya, the Supreme Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre on a petition filed by a BJP leader’s petition seeking to open Kashi and Mathura temple disputes.

A Bench led by Chief Justice of India SA Bobde asked the Centre to respond to Delhi BJP leader and advocate Ashwini Upadhyay’s petition challenging the validity of certain provisions of the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, which said character of religious places – except the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid at Ayodhya — at the time of Independence can’t be changed.

Courts at Varanasi and Mathura are already seized of petitions on the issue. The petition is being seen as an attempt to start a fresh legal battle to reclaim disputed religious sites at Kashi, Mathura and some other places.

Represented by senior advocates Vikas Singh and Gopal Sankaranarayanan, the BJP leader alleged that the 1991 law creates an “arbitrary and irrational retrospective cut-off date” of August 15, 1947, for maintaining the character of the places of worship or pilgrimage against encroachment done by “fundamentalist-barbaric invaders and law-breakers”.

Sections 2, 3 and 4 of the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, be set aside on grounds, including that these provisions take away the right of a judicial remedy to reclaim a place of worship of any person or a religious group, the petition contended.

Earlier, the Vishwa Bhadra Pujari Purohit Mahasangh had moved the top court in June 2020 challenging the validity of the 1991 Act.

The Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind has already moved the top court against the Mahasangh’s plea, saying it will open floodgates of litigation against countless mosques.