Amid multiple suits being filed across country by Hindus seeking claim over religious places of Muslims alleging that they were earlier temples but converted to mosques during Mughal era and the lower court entertaining such pleas allegedly in violation of Places of Worship Act, SC will hear pleas challenging validity of the law which barred any litigation to change the character of a religious place from what it was at the time of Independence.
A three-judge bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justices Sanjay Kumar and K V Viswanathan will hear a batch of petitions seeking quashing of the law on Dec 12.
A five-judge bench, while pronouncing the Ayodhya verdict, had approved the law and held that Places of Worship Act ‘imposes a non-derogable obligation towards enforcing our commitment to secularism” and it is a legislative instrument designed to protect secular features of Indian polity, which is one of the basic features of the Constitution. The verdict, reportedly penned by Justice D Y Chandrachud, said in no uncertain terms that historical wrongs cannot be remedied by people taking the law in their own hands and Parliament has mandated in no uncertain terms that history and its wrongs shall not be used as instruments to oppress present and future.”This court cannot entertain claims that stem from actions of Mughal rulers against Hindu places of worship in a court of law today. For any person who seeks solace or recourse against actions of any number of ancient rulers, the law is not the answer. Our history is replete with actions that have been judged to be morally incorrect and even today are liable to trigger vociferous ideological debate. However, adoption of the Constitution marks a watershed moment where we, the people of India, departed from determination of rights and liabilities on the basis of our ideology, religion, colour of skin, or the century when our ancestors arrived at these lands, and submitted to the rule of law,” the verdict said.Months after the Ayodhya verdict, petitions were filed in SC challenging validity of the law on grounds of being “arbitrary and unreasonable and infringing the fundamental right to practice religion”. The petitioners included BJP’s Ashwini Upadhyay, Subramanian Swamy and other Hindu organisations seeking to open litigation routes for ownership claims over disputed sites like those at Kashi and Mathura.
During hearing on disputes involving Gyanvapi mosque, a bench headed by Justice Chandrachud observed that ascertaining the religious character of a place of worship was not barred under Places of Worship Act which emboldened others to seek court-mandated surveys like, most recently in Sambhal and Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti’s shrine in Ajmer.
