Ayodhya case: UP opposes Muslim groups’ plea to refer mosque issue to larger bench

The Uttar Pradesh government on Friday opposed the demand raised by Muslim groups to refer a 1994 judgement holding that mosque was not integral to Islam to a larger bench, saying the argument was intended to delay the hearing in the “long-pending” Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid title suit.

Muslim parties in the civil dispute have questioned the finding of the 1994 verdict in the case of M Ismail Faruqui.

Additional solicitor general Tushar Mehta, representing UP, told a special bench led by Chief Justice Dipak Misra that the MIsmail Faruqui case dated back to 1994 and no party to the dispute had ever “disputed” its “correctness” for so many years.

It was never even raised before the Allahabad High Court, which had on September 30, 2010 delivered its verdict on the land dispute, Mehta said.

The Supreme Court is hearing appeals arising out of the HC judgement.

Mehta pointed out that appeals have been pending for “almost eight long years and the parties which are now belatedly raising an unsustainable plea, chose not to raise any such plea at all during all these years”.

Such a plea, he said, was not even made when the top court passed orders for translation of pleadings and evidence.

“When all translations are made and evidence is compiled in several volumes and all appeals become ripe for hearing, suddenly belated efforts are being made visibly and demonstratively to delay the judicial adjudication,” Mehta contended.

Senior advocate Rajeev Dhavan, who on behalf of the Muslim parties made the plea, argued that to decide if any practice was an essential one, the courts needed to look into the tenets and also examine them in detail. But, this was not done in the Faruqui case.

“Mosques are not built for fun. There are thousands and thousands of mosques all over the world and hundreds in India. If they are not essential, why do Muslims go to mosques on Fridays? Islam is also a congregational religion. If the congregational part of Islam is taken away, a large part of Islam collapses,” Dhavan submitted.