Top court may not address all matters related to Shahi Eidgah dispute
The Supreme Court on Tuesday signalled that it may not directly address all issues related to the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Eidgah mosque dispute.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday signalled that it may not directly address all issues related to the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Eidgah mosque dispute if certain matters within the case could be addressed through an intra-court appeal before a division bench in the Allahabad high court.
A bench of justices Sanjiv Khanna and PV Sanjay Kumar asked the representatives of the Shahi Eidgah Mosque committee to justify why they should not be remitted to a division bench in the high court to assail a previous ruling by a single judge bench that the trial in 18 suits relating to the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Eidgah dispute were maintainable and could continue.
Advocate Tasneem Ahmadi, representing the mosque committee, argued that the high court’s ruling involved superintendence, which should preclude further appeals within the high court’s jurisdiction.
The bench, however, disagreed, pointing out that the high court was acting in an original capacity, and that the provision of an intra-court appeal was perhaps available against the August 1 order of the single judge bench. It asked Ahmadi to review specific provisions in the Allahabad high court rules. The bench clarified that an appeal could be directed to the high court’s division bench, rather than escalating the matter immediately to the Supreme Court. It asked Ahmadi to submit a note regarding the maintainability of the matter before the top court and scheduled the next hearing after two weeks.
The controversy is related to the Mughal-era Shahi Eidgah mosque in Mathura, which Hindu groups say was built by emperor Aurangzeb after demolishing a temple at the mythical birthplace of Lord Krishna. The suits filed by Hindu litigants seek removal of the Shahi Eidgah mosque as well as restoration of the temple.
Apart from the present proceedings initiated by the mosque committee against the August 1 ruling regarding the maintainability of the suits led by the Hindu parties, the top court is also seized of the challenge to a May 26 order of the Allahabad high court that transferred to itself nearly 18 suits filed by Hindu parties in various civil courts in Mathura, claiming right over the mosque land. The Idgah committee and UP Sunni Waqf Board brought the matter to the Supreme Court. Later, it also assailed a subsequent order paving the way for a survey of the mosque premises by an advocate commissioner.
The apex court on January 16 stayed the high court’s order for the appointment of an advocate-commissioner to oversee the mosque survey while noting that the Hindu side’s plea for the survey was “very vague” and that the matter also raised some significant legal issues that required judicial scrutiny.
The high court order under challenge had come on a plea by Bhagwan Shrikrishna Virajman at Katra Keshav Dev Khewat Mathura -- the presiding deity -- through next friend, Ranjana Agnihotri, who is also an advocate, and seven others. Next friend is a legal representative of someone incapable of maintaining a suit directly. The Hindu petitioners requested that the original trial be conducted by the high court as the matter was of national importance.
On the other hand, the mosque management committee questioned the maintainability of the suits after a prolonged delay, and further argued that the suit is barred by the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, which locks the religious character of shrines as they existed on August 15, 1947.
The mosque management committee subsequently filed a separate plea before the Allahabad high court questioning the maintainability of the suits. However, by an order on August 1, the high court held that the suits were maintainable.
Multiple suits regarding the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Eidgah Mosque land dispute are pending before various courts in Mathura and have a common demand to reclaim the 13.37-acre land on which the mosque stands. The mosque abuts the temple, and the suits have sought to annul a compromise entered between the mosque committee and Shri Krishna Janmasthan Seva Sangh in 1968.
On December 14, 2023, the Allahabad high court ordered a survey by an advocate-commissioner. The survey was ordered to be conducted on the lines of a similar but controversial exercise at the Gyanvapi Masjid in Varanasi last year, when Hindu petitioners claimed that a disputed structure found in the mosque premises was a “shivling”, though Muslims said it was part of a ritual ablution fountain.
A batch of petitions — some seeking to scrap the 1991 Act and some others asking for tight enforcement of the same law — are also pending before the top court since March 2021. Last September, Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud, while hearing the Gyanvapi case, observed that the religious “character” of a site also had to be led by evidence.
The case is part of a decades-old ideological project by Hindu groups that argue that medieval-era Islamic structures were built by demolishing temples and demand rights over those structures. Cases by Hindu groups and individuals in Varanasi and Mathura are currently being adjudicated in courts across Uttar Pradesh, even as a larger issue relating to the Place of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991 has remained pending before the Supreme Court since 2021.