Express News Service
LUCKNOW: A Varanasi civil court on Thursday allowed the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to conduct a survey at the Kashi Vishwanath Temple-Gyanvapi mosque complex.
The ASI has been asked to set up a five-member committee, comprising two from the minority communities, to conduct the survey. The court directed the Uttar Pradesh government to bear the cost of the survey so conducted.
Local lawyer Vishnu Shankar Rastogi had filed a plea demanding restoration of the land entailing Gyanvapi Mosque to Hindus claiming that Mughal emperor Aurangzeb had pulled down a portion of 2,000-year-old Kashi Vishwanath Temple to build the mosque there in 1644. Rastogi had filed the petition to claim the land for Hindus on behalf of Swayambhu Jyotirlinga Bhagwan Vishweshwar.
Kashi Vishwanath-Gyanvapi Mosque dispute: Varanasi court allows ASI to undertake survey
The court further directed the Uttar Pradesh government to bear the cost of the survey
A civil court in Varanasi on Thursday gave its approval for survey of Kashi Vishwanath temple and Gyanvapi Mosque complex by Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). The court further directed the Uttar Pradesh government to bear the cost of the survey.
The order was issued after a petition was filed by a local lawyer VS Rastogi who had demanded that the land entailing the Gyanvapi Mosque be restored to Hindus. The petitioner claimed that Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb in 1664 pulled down a portion of the 2000-year-old Kashi Vishwanath temple to build the mosque in its place. The Gyanvyapi Mosque management committee had opposed the petition.
VARANASI: A local court on Thursday allowed a survey of the entire Gyanvapi Mosque complex, adjacent to the Kashi Vishwanath temple here, by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to find out whether the religious structure standing at the present and disputed site is a superimposition, alteration or addition, or there is structural overlapping of any kind .
The order came just over a year after the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Ram Janmabhoomi in Ayodhya, saying there will be a Ram Mandir at the disputed site and Muslims will be given an alternate 5-acre land for their mosque.
The judge asked the Uttar Pradesh government to get examined the disputed premises by a five-member team of the Archaeological Survey of India. (File Photo)
VARANASI: A local court of civil judge on Thursday allowed a survey of entire Gyanvapi mosque complex, adjacent to the Kashi Vishwanath temple, by the Archaeological Survey of India to find out whether the religious structure standing at the present and disputed site is a superimposition, alteration or addition, or there is structural overlapping of any kind.
In its order, the court of civil judge (senior division), fast track, Ashutosh Tiwai, directed the ASI director general to constitute a five-member committee of eminent persons who are experts and well-versed in the science of archaeology, two of which should preferably belong to the minority community.
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