UP: Gyanvapi plaintiffs offer prayers at Kashi Vishwanath Dham

VARANASI: Four women plaintiffs in suit no. 18/2022 Rakhi Singh vs UP state and others seeking the right to worship Shringar Gauri and other deities, along with their lawyer Vishnu Jain reached the Kashi Vishwanath Dham on Tuesday and offered religious rituals on completion of one year of the detection of purported ‘Shivling’ in the ablution pond of the Gyanvapi masjid during a court-mandated survey on May 16, 2022.
Jain, along with four women plaintiffs, Laxmi Devi, Sita Sahu, Manju Vyas and Rekha Pathak, and others reached the Kashi Vishwanath temple and performed ‘Jalabhishek’ rituals. He said, “We sought blessings of Lord Vishwanath for our wishes to be fulfilled at the earliest.”
In the suit filed by Rakhi Singh of Delhi and Laxmi Devi, Sita Sahu, Manju Vyas and Rekha Pathak of Varanasi in 2021 to seek permission for daily prayers and rituals pertaining to the Shringar Gauri and other deities in the Gyanvapi compound, while stopping the opponents from causing any damage to the statues, the then civil judge (senior division) Ravi Kumar Diwakar had ordered survey of Gyanvapi by appointing advocate commissioner.
The court-mandated survey was conducted between May 6 and 16 in 2022. On the concluding day of the survey, claims were made of unearthing of 'Shivling’ in the ablution pond of Gyanvapi mosque. The ablution pond area was sealed on court order. On May 19, 2022 Anjuman Intezamia Masjid (AIM) -- the Gyanvapi mosque management committee -- turned to the Supreme Court, which transferred the civil suit from the court of civil judge (senior division) to the district judge in May 2022.
On September 12, 2022, district judge Ajay Kumar Vishvesha rejected the petition of AIM questioning the maintainability of the suit. After it, four women plaintiffs had moved the demand of scientific investigation of `Shivling’ which was rejected by the district judge court on October 14, 2022. They then took shelter of Allahabad High Court, which allowed scientific survey of ‘Shivling’ under aegis and guidance of the Archaeological Survey of India on May 12.
Earlier, on December 5, 2022, Jain had moved another application to transfer seven cases, including six pending in the court of civil judge (senior division) and one in the fast-track court of the civil judge (senior division), to the court of district judge by mentioning that all these suits are of similar nature and hence if they are tried together, public time and money would be saved and unavoidable difficulties of legal nature may not arise. On April 17 the district judge accepted this plea and all seven cases were transferred to his court from different courts. Hearing on their consolidation has been completed and the court is likely to deliver its order on it on May 19.