Allahabad high court upheld the maintainability of a batch of lawsuits by Hindu plaintiffs seeking to reclaim the site of Mathura’s Shahi Eidgah as being part of Shri Krishna Janmabhoomi before a pre-existing temple was purportedly razed to make way for the Aurangzeb-era mosque there.
Dismissing the Shahi Eidgah committee's petition challenging the maintainability of these lawsuits, Justice Mayank Kumar Jain said there was no provision in any of the cited laws barring the plaintiffs from presenting their arguments to have a court determine the religious character of a particular place of worship. The Muslim side had argued that the lawsuits weren’t maintainable under the Places of Worship Act, 1991; Waqf Act, 1995; Specific Relief Act, 1963; and the Limitation Act, 1963.
Justice Jain cited several past judgments, including the HC's observations in the Kashi Vishwanath Temple-Gyanvapi case, to drive home the point that the religious character of a disputed place of worship needs to be determined.
The order states, “Either the Gyanvapi compound has a Hindu religious character or a Muslim religious character. It can’t have a dual character... The religious character (of a place of worship) has to be ascertained by the court considering the pleadings of the parties, and evidence led in support of pleadings”.
“No conclusion can be reached on the basis of framing of preliminary issues of law. The (Places of Worship) Act only bars conversion of a place of worship; it does not define or lay down any procedure for determining the religious character of place of worship that existed as on 15.08.1947,” it adds, quoting the Dec 19, 2023, order in the KVT-Gyanvapi case.
Justice Jain had reserved his verdict on June 6 after hearing the arguments of the Shahi Eidgah committee and UP Sunni Central Waqf Board.
