District judge AK Vishvesha is to pronounce orders…
On Monday, 12 September 2022, The court of Varanasi's senior-most judge is expected to decide whether a case filed by five Hindu women seeking the right to worship inside the city's Gyanvapi mosque, located next to the famous Kashi Viswanath temple, is "acceptable" or not.
District judge AK Vishvesha is likely to pronounce orders on whether the case by the women -- that led to a survey inside the Gyanvapi mosque -- will continue to be heard or whether it will cease to have any legal standing on this.
Advocate Vishnu Shanker Jain is representing the five Hindu women who filed the case pertaining to the Gyanvapi mosque, in hope that the Supreme Court rules in their favour.
The Places Of Worship Act, 1991 was cited by the mosque committee and we put our arguments in the court scientifically, he said.
We are saying that Vyas ji was being worshiped in the basement of the Gyanvapi mosque till 1993, Mr. Jain contended, adding that their case is "strong". If we win the case today, we will demand carbon dating to be done by conducting further surveys of the pond used for "Wazoo" in the mosque, he added.
In May, the SC assigned the Gyanvapi case to the Varanasi district judge's court, shifting it from a lower court where it was being heard.
A month before the SC's intervention in the case, the Varanasi civil court had ordered the filming of the Gyanvapi mosque, based on the petition by the Hindu women who claim there are idols of Hindu Gods and goddesses in the Gyanvapi mosque complex.
A report of the filming at the mosque was then submitted to the Varanasi court in a sealed cover, but the Hindu petitioners controversially released details just a few hours later.
The report claimed that a "Shivling" had been found in a pond within the mosque complex which is used for "Wazoo" or purification rituals before Muslim prayers. The judge hearing the case at the time had ordered the sealing of the pond.
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