Allahabad High Court stays trial court proceedings in Sambhal mosque case till February 25
The case pertains to a claim that a Hindu temple had existed at the site of the Shahi Jama Masjid in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal.
The Allahabad High Court on Wednesday stayed further proceedings before a trial court in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal about the Shahi Jama Masjid till February 25, Live Law reported.
A single-judge bench of Justice Rohit Ranjan Agarwal passed the order on a plea filed by the managing committee of the mosque against a November 19 order passed by the trial court ordering a survey of the disputed site.
The trial court’s order came on a suit filed by Hindu activists claiming that the mosque had been built in 1526 by Mughal ruler Babar on the site of the “centuries-old Shri Hari Har Temple dedicated to Lord Kalki”.
Five persons were killed in violence during protests in November against the survey of the mosque.
On Wednesday, the Allahabad High Court also directed the Union government, Archaeological Survey of India, Uttar Pradesh government, District Magistrate, and the plaintiffs in the suit to submit their responses within two weeks, Live Law reported.
The proceedings in the case were already deferred in effect since November 29 when the Supreme Court directed the trial court not to proceed with the case until the mosque committee’s petition was listed before the Allahabad High Court.
On December 12, the Supreme Court barred trial courts from passing orders, including survey directions, in pending lawsuits concerning the religious character of places of worship.
It also said that no new suits can be registered in any court across the country until further orders while it hears a clutch of petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the 1991 Places of Worship Special Provisions Act.
The Act does not allow any changes to the religious character of a place of worship as it existed on August 15, 1947.
These directions also extend to the case in Sambhal and thus the advocate commissioner’s survey report of the disputed mosque has been submitted to the local court and is kept in a sealed cover, The Wire reported.
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How SC’s evasion on Places of Worship Act challenge is powering new Hindutva claims on mosques
