Varanasi court transfers new petition seeking ban on Muslim entry in Gyanvapi Mosque to fast track court

A Varanasi district court on Wednesday transferred a new petition, filed by a saffron outfit seeking a ban on the entry of the Muslims in the Gyanvapi Mosque and handing over the entire premises to the Hindus, to a fast track court for further hearing.

The fast track court fixed May 30 for a further hearing of the petition, which was filed by Vedic Sanatan Sangh president Jitendra Singh Bisen's wife Kiran Bisen.

The petition, which was filed in the court of civil judge senior division Ravi Kumar Diwakar on Tuesday, was transferred to the fast track court judge Mahendra Pandey.

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The counsel of the petitioner said that the petition had sought ban on the entry of Muslims in the Mosque, handing over the premises to the Hindus and permission to immediately start worshipping the 'shivling', which, the Hindu petitioners claimed, was found in the Mosque during the recently concluded videography survey.

The new petition came amid the hearing the of the bunch of petitions regarding the Gyanvapi Mosque in the court of district judge Ajai Kumar Cishwesh, who on Tuesday ruled that it would first hear the lawyers for the Mosque Committee on the issue of admissibility of the applications by the Hindu petitioners and also the legality of the recently undertaken videography survey inside the Mosque, on Thursday.

A district court had earlier ordered the sealing of the place inside the Gyanvapi Mosque after Hindu lawyers claimed that a 'shivling' was found in a pond whose water was used for 'wuzu' (cleansing of body parts before prayers) by the Muslims. The lawyers representing the Muslims, however, refuted the claim and said that what was being called a 'shivalinga' was in fact a 'fountain'.

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The supreme court had a few days back referred the matter back to the district court saying that a senior judge should hear the matter. It also allowed the Muslims to offer prayers inside the Mosque.

The premises had been a bone of contention between the two communities for the past several decades but there was renewed clamour to ''take back'' the Kashi Vishwanath Temple premises by the saffron outfits after the favourable decision of the apex court in the Ram Temple case.