The registrar of the apex court telephonically conveyed to the mosque committee’s advocate a message from the Chief Justice of India that they have to approach the Allahabad High Court.
Team Clarion
NEW DELHI — The Supreme Court on Wednesday night refused an urgent hearing against the permission to the Hindu side to perform pooja (prayers) in the southern cellar of the Gyanvpai Masjid in Uttar Pradesh’s Varanasi city.
The Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee had approached the Supreme Court against a district court’s order that permitted Hindus to worship inside the sealed basement of the mosque complex.
Few hours after the court passed the order on Wednesday afternoon, the masjid committee filed an urgent application seeking status quo at the mosque site. The lawyers of the mosque committee approached the residence of the Supreme Court registrar in night seeking an urgent hearing at night itself, raising the apprehension that pooja will be performed inside the mosque during the night.
The registrar replied that he would inform after taking instructions from the Chief Justice of India.
At about 7 a.m. on Thursday, the registrar telephonically conveyed to the mosque committee’s Advocate-on-Record Fuzail Ahmad Ayyubi the message from the Chief Justice of India that they have to approach the Allahabad High Court. Advocates Nizam Pasha, Rashmi Singh, Ibad Mushtaq, Akansha Rai were also in the legal team of the Gyanvapi mosque committee.
In the application, the mosque committee contended that the administration was acting in ‘hot haste’ soon after the Varanasi Court’s order to allow the pooja at night itself.
The application argued that these actions, occurring in the middle of the night, aimed to preempt any legal challenge by the mosque managing committee.
The application was moved as an interlocutory application in a pending Special Leave Petition filed by the committee challenging a 2022 order passed by a Varanasi court allowing the appointment of a Court Commissioner to inspect the mosque. They argued that the Varanasi court’s latest order was in violation of a May 2022 interim order passed by the Supreme Court clarifying that the rights of the Muslims to access the mosque or to use the mosque to perform mamaz and religious observances were not impeded. Last August, the Supreme Court allowed the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to conduct the survey of the mosque premises, excluding the ‘wuzukhana’ area where a ‘shivling’ was claimed to have been found. The ASI’s survey aimed to determine if the mosque was built over a pre-existing Hindu temple structure.
