Kashi, Mathura on agenda after Ram Temple: Hindu seers

Even before the supreme court verdict in the vexed Ram Janambhoomi-Babri Masjid title suits, Hindu seers declared that their next agenda would be to ''free'' Kashi and Mathura.

All India Akhara Parishad (AIAP), an apex body of the seers in the country, said on Thursday that it would launch a movement to get the mosques adjoining the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi and Shrikrishna Janambhoomi in Mathura once the Ram Temple was built.

''Like the Babri Masjid, temples were also demolished at Kashi and Mathura to build mosques....the mosques must be demolished,'' AIAP president Mahant Narendra Giri said on Thursday.

He said that there was a ''pro-Hindu'' government in Uttar Pradesh as well as at the centre and hence there should not be any problem in achieving the twin objectives.

''Like Ram Temple, the Kashi and Mathura too are revered by the Hindus worldwide.....they belong to us and we will take them,'' the Mahant (religious head) said.

Narendra Giri said that the Muslims should withdraw their claims on Kashi and Mathura also to promote communal harmony.

Interestingly the Sunni Central Waqf Board, one of the main Muslim plaintiffs in the Ayodhya title suits, had, in its ''settlement proposal'' to the SC appointed mediation panel, sought the Hindus to withdraw their claims on Kashi and Mathura mosques as one of the pre-conditions for resolving the dispute through negotiations.

Giri, however, made it clear that the Hindus would, under no circumstances, withdraw their claim on Kashi and Mathura.

Senior BJP leader Vinay Katiyar had also said that Kashi and Mathura too belonged to the Hindus.

The mosques in Varanasi and Mathura adjoined the Kashi Vishwanath Temple and the Shrikrishna Janambhoomi respectively.