Mathura court orders survey of Shahi Idgah from Jan 2, seeks report on Jan 20

The court passed the order on a lawsuit filed by Vishnu Gupta of the Hindu Sena

In a significant ruling, a district court in Mathura on Saturday ordered a survey of the Shahi Idgah Mosque adjacent to the Shri Krishna Janmabhoomi.

Civil Judge (third) Sonika Verma passed the order on a petition filed by the president of the Hindu Sena Vishnu Gupta and vice president Surjit Singh Yadav. The court ordered the 'Amin' (a revenue official) to conduct the survey of the disputed site and submit the report by January 20, when the matter would come for hearing again.

Gupta and Yadav, in their petition, have contended that the Shahi Idgah Mosque had been built by the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb after demolishing a part of the Shri Krishna Janmabhoomi.

Petitioners claimed ownership over the entire 13.37 acres of land on which they were situated. They have also challenged the 1968 agreement between the Shahi Idgah Mosque Committee and the Shrikrishna Janmabhoomi Trust allowing the Mosque to continue to exist and use the land on which it was situated. They also sought a videography survey of the disputed site on the lines of the videography survey of the Gyanvapi Mosque next to the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi.

Earlier the Allahabad high court had the Mathura court to dispose of the petition seeking a videography survey of the entire land on which the Srikrishna Janmabhoomi was situated within four months.

A total of nine petitions were pending in the Mathura district courts with regard to the ownership claims of the Shrikrishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Idgah Mosque Complex. All the petitions were filed by the Hindu parties.

The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), which had spearheaded the Ram Temple movement, had made it clear that the Shrikrishna Janmabhoomi issue would be taken up in 2024 the year the next general elections were scheduled to be held in the country.