The Supreme Court directed the mosque committee to challenge the local court’s survey order in the High Court, assuring that the petition would be heard within three days.
The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Uttar Pradesh government to maintain peace and harmony in Sambhal while halting further proceedings by a local court regarding the survey of the Shahi Jama Masjid until January 8. The court advised the mosque committee to challenge the survey order in the High Court, assuring that the petition would be listed for hearing within three days.
The Supreme Court directed that the advocate commissioner’s survey report be kept confidential. It stated, “We trust that the trial court will refrain from taking any further steps in the matter until the High Court addresses the proceedings and issues appropriate orders.”
The Supreme Court took up the case days after violence broke out during the survey on November 24, resulting in four fatalities. Late Thursday night, the Uttar Pradesh government appointed former Allahabad High Court judge Devendra Kumar Arora to lead a three-member committee to investigate the incident.
The dispute originated from a suit filed on November 19 in Sambhal’s civil court by eight plaintiffs, including Supreme Court lawyer Hari Shankar Jain. The suit claimed that the Shahi Jama Masjid was constructed on the site of a “Harihar Temple” and sought access to the location, referring to it as a temple.
Jain and his son, advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain, have filed similar lawsuits, including those involving the Gyanvapi Mosque near Varanasi’s Kashi Vishwanath Temple and Mathura’s Shree Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Idgah.
In the Sambhal case, the local court appointed an advocate commissioner for a photographic and videographic survey of the mosque on the same day the suit was filed. The order was issued ex parte, with no prior notice to the mosque management, and the survey was conducted within hours. A second survey was carried out five days later, with the mosque committee receiving barely six hours’ notice.
In its petition to the Supreme Court, the mosque’s managing committee requested an immediate halt to the survey. It argued that conducting surveys, especially at historic places of worship, could heighten communal tensions and jeopardize the country’s secular fabric. The plea also challenged the legality and process through which the survey was ordered.
The plea, bypassing the Allahabad High Court, urged the Supreme Court to intervene directly to prevent further communal unrest and uphold judicial propriety in managing sensitive disputes involving historic places of worship.
The petition argued that the actions were carried out hastily, denying the committee an opportunity to contest the order or seek legal remedies. It contended that the case violated the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, which bars altering the character of a religious site as it existed on August 15, 1947. Additionally, it cited the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958, which safeguards historic places of worship from desecration or misuse.
The petition also pointed to procedural flaws in the civil court’s order, such as the absence of clear reasoning or terms of reference for the survey. It emphasized that such surveys in disputes over places of worship risk fueling communal tensions.
On November 22, the Supreme Court emphasized the need to assess the legal maintainability of a suit filed by a group of Hindu women seeking the right to worship Hindu deities within the Gyanvapi mosque complex, in light of the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991. The mosque management committee has contended that such suits are barred under the 1991 Act, which preserves the religious character of all places of worship as it existed on August 15, 1947, with the sole exception of the Ayodhya Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute.
Meanwhile, a series of petitions challenging the validity of the 1991 Act and seeking its strict enforcement have been pending before the Supreme Court since March 2021.
