Gyanvapi: Back to Masjid Vs Temple?

Chanting of ‘Mantra’ on 16th Maybaba got it‘ Arrived outside the Gyanvapi Mosque of Varanasi to fill the streets. A court-mandated survey of the mosque reportedly presented evidence reinforcing the suspicions of many Hindu believers and religious organizations: Gyanvapi may have been built on the foundations of the famous Vishweshwara temple that Aurangzeb destroyed in 1669. The floral motifs on the walls of the mosque were a clue of sorts, but in the end, it was the clear discovery of a gender-like the structure that got the devotees excited about the parts of the temple buried below.

As soon as the news spread that an alleged ‘Shivling’‘ Was found inside the mosque premises, Manju Vyas, a resident of Varanasi, wanted to go inside Gyanvapi immediately”VisitWhen told that women were not allowed inside Gyanvapi, he replied, “We are going to the temple, not the mosque.” Vyas, along with four women petitioners, moved a local court on August 18 last year. and demanded that they be allowed to worship Shringar Gauri 365 days in a year. Sitting on a red stone platform located on the western wall of Gyanvapi, the goddess is worshiped only on one day of the year – Chaitra Navratri Ki Chaturthi (fourth day).

The plaintiff’s second appeal was: they wanted to pray to “all the visible and invisible gods within the old temple complex”. On 26 April, when the Varanasi court assured the petitioners that the disputed Gyanvapi site would be inspected, there were some who found resonance in the Ayodhya Ram Janmabhoomi case. In that case also the survey of the court commissioner proved to be important.

VN Arora, former principal of Saket Degree College in Ayodhya, explains, “In the Ayodhya case, the civil judge of Faizabad appointed the court commissioner on 1 April 1950 to prepare a map of the disputed site. After this, from the High Court to the Supreme Court, the report of the Court Commissioner was discussed in the whole matter. The same report is also part of the Supreme Court’s decision in November 2019. Apart from the litigation, one can already hear a tinge of emotion in the arguments of the Banarasians which are reminiscent of 1992.

Advocate Sudhir Tripathi is representing Vyas and his fellow petitioners in the Varanasi Court. He insists that his clients have almost won his case: “You can no longer call Gyanvapi a mosque. Have you ever heard of such a mosque in which Shivling Or idols of other Hindu gods and goddesses? Wouldn’t it be great if we could reach an understanding and send a message to the world that in India we resolve age-old differences through reconciliation? The decision is theirs – to give us now or give later.”

time period , Namaz fought in Gyanvapi

Gyanvapi’s caretaker committee, Anjuman Intizamiya Masjid (AIM), says it prefers to maintain its faith in the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act of 1991, and not react to veiled threats. Passed by the Narasimha Rao government at the peak of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement in 1991, the Act stated that the religious character of all places of worship under litigation, except Ayodhya, would be maintained on August 15, 1947. In November 2019, when a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court decided the Ayodhya title suit in favor of allowing the construction of a temple at the disputed site, it upheld the provisions of the 1991 Act, which said, “ In preserving the character of public places of worship, Parliament has mandated in no uncertain terms that history and its mistakes will not be used as instruments to oppress the present and the future. ,

Even though there are two petitions before the Supreme Court challenging the law that it prohibits judicial review, AIM general secretary SM Yasin says he will still choose the law over history. “History is unconvincing,” he says. “You will not find the true history of Gyanvapi anywhere. I believe in the status quo that the Places of Worship Act of 1991 ensures that.” Advocate Tripathi has made preparations to tighten the taunt on his behalf. “If we have found a Shivling there today, that means there was a Shivling there in 1947. This was also in the time of Aurangzeb. If you go and offer prayer In the temple, does he turn the temple into a mosque? No, neither dome. they are offering prayer In a temple.”

In 1936, when a certain Din Mohammad filed a civil suit before a court in Varanasi, asking for the Gyanvapi complex to be declared a Waqf site, was already an open question. When the court rejected Mohammad’s petition, he appealed to the Allahabad High Court. In 1937, the High Court ruled that the Gyanvapi mosque complex belonged to Muslims, and they had the right to offer prayers there, but it also allotted the mosque cellar to the Vyas family. interesting thing Vazukhanaa structure for bathing Shivling Now found, the mosque was accepted as property in 1937.

Advocate Abhay Yadav, who represents AIM in Varanasi court, says he was a witness to the discovery gender-like structure. “As a lawyer for AIM, I was inside Gyanvapi when the structure was found. I can safely tell you it’s a fountain, not gender,

Advocates further say that they also find the Supreme Court order of May 17 strange that allows Muslims to offer prayer saving in knowledge Shivling that was found. “If you lay siege to that area, you prevent people from using Vazukhana, How can a Muslim give prayer without performing wazoo, Plus, isn’t it weird how we can now ‘allow’ people to prayer What is their lot in the place of worship?”

While Vyas and his fellow plaintiffs begin by asking similar questions about Maa Shringar Gauri, there are some in Banaras who, in turn, doubt her piety. Notably as the Vyasa family, Manju, apart from Vyasa, is the priest of the temples of Nandi, Ganesha, Gaurishankar, Tarakeswar Mahadev and Lord Hanuman, and also the caretaker of the Shringar Gauri temple. Jitendra Nath Vyas, who oversees the puja at the temple, says, “Shringar Gauri is visited daily, but is worshiped only once a year – on the Chaturthi of Vasant Chaitra Navratri. This tradition has been going on since time immemorial. Shringar Gauri is not worshiped regularly and this demand is not justified.

In 1991, when the Ram temple movement was reaching its peak in Ayodhya, the dispute related to Kashi Vishwanath and Gyanvapi Masjid also reached the court of Varanasi. After the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, security was tightened in Gyanvapi, and the entire complex was cordoned off. Mahant of Kalika Mandir Surendra Tiwari says, “In 1996, Hindu and Muslim festivals used to fall on the same day. The road leading to Shringar Gauri was closed in view of security. After that it was closed forever.”

After the inauguration of work on the Kashi Vishwanath Corridor in 2021, a walkway was built in the western part of the Gyanvapi complex, making the Shringar Gauri temple quite accessible. Vyas family’s lawyer Indu Prakash Srivastava says, “Shringar Gauri’s devotees are becoming regular Visit Now, but the tradition is that the puja is performed only once in a year. No one has taken the opinion of the Vyas family, the priest of the temple, on the issue of daily worship in the Shringar Gauri temple. The matter seems to be sponsored by outside elements.” The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Shiv Sena, are already running a ‘Shringar Gauri Mukti Andolan’.

Maulana Abdul Batin Numani, the Imam of Gyanvapi, finds it strange that the worship of Shringar Gauri has raised this hornet’s nest. Even though AIM’s Yasin says the annual worship of the goddess has been an age-old practice, Numani says that Hindus themselves are divided as to where the Shringar Gauri temple should ideally be located. “Their own mahants say the temple is not here, it is somewhere else. Wherever Shringar Gauri is, the mosque has nothing to do with it.” Surprisingly, Noumani considers the court-mandated survey a ray of hope: “It’s not wrong. We’ve always welcomed it. Truth to all.” Will find out.”

Although the AIM had taken a stand – that there would be no videography inside the mosque or its basement – the Varanasi court on May 12 ordered the resumption of the survey. The AIM also wanted to replace the “biased” advocate commissioner Ajay Kumar Mishra, but instead Judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar expanded its team. In the three days in which Mishra conducted his survey (14-16 May), Imam Numani says he was shocked at how often the findings, which should have been confidential, were being leaked. “Yeh mil gaya, woh mil gaya (We found this. We found that). What right do you have to say all this to the media? You are only spreading lies in the minds of people. Such behavior should be punished. ” Mishra came to know of his presence on May 17, when Justice Diwakar relinquished his duties after he hired his own cameraman to conduct the survey.

Jitendra Singh Bisen is an outsider in Banaras. Representing his Delhi-based niece Rakhi Singh, one of the five Shringar Gauri Wadi, Bisen took only a few hours to convene a press conference, rumored to be a genderSimilar structure was found in Gyanvapi. Bisen, president of Vishwa Vaidik Sanatan Sangh, an organization headquartered in UP’s Gonda district, said, “I want to appeal to the nation not to let your sentiments overwhelm you. yes one Shivling Found in Gyanvapi, but please act with patience and discretion. We have a constitutional fight.”

It seemed that Bisen wanted to make it clear that the fight would not be long when his organization was involved: “We didn’t file these cases thinking they would drag on for 500 years. No matter where we file a case in Mathura, Kashi, Qutub Minar, Taj Mahal- you will see that we get results fast. These are the changes we will see in our lifetimes.”

Bisen’s threat should not be taken lightly, given the frequency with which cases are disturbing the peace of our monuments and places of worship. Notably, VHP international working president Alok Kumar had already declared that the Place of Worship Act does not apply to the “Gyanvapi Temple”. Clearly, Kashi is likely to be a new flashpoint. After hearing the news ofShivling Discovery’, RSS’s Akhil Bharatiya Prachar Pramukh Sunil Ambekar said, “You cannot suppress history for long. This is the right time to bring all such evidence to your people.”

While the Gyanvapi case has all the reasons for another temple vs mosque fight in Ayodhya, there are important differences. For one, the site would require the BJP to amend the Places of Worship Act of 1991, using its brute majority in Parliament to remove Section 3 of the Act, which allows individuals and groups of people to access one’s place of worship. prevents converting. religious denomination, and Section 4, which declares that the religious character of a place of worship “remains the same” as it was on August 15, 1947.

Since the Supreme Court had already upheld the 1991 Act in its 2019 Ayodhya verdict and held that the law preserves the fundamental values ​​of the Constitution, any such move by the ruling government should be taken up with the country’s highest court. must be challenged.

BJP leaders are attentive in Banaras. Recently elected MLA from Varanasi (South) Daya Shankar Mishra said: “Both sides will respect the court’s decision. This survey is currently being conducted. We really shouldn’t be thinking about the possibilities of a bleak future. Banaras is a city of understanding.” When it comes to matters of peace, Congress leader Gaurav Kapur finds common ground with Mishra: “Varanasi is a land of many entrepreneurs and we would have preferred to focus on that rather than anything else. ‘What did Aurangzeb do? What did Babur do?’ This is just 100 per cent political propaganda. Wouldn’t it be better if we stopped worrying about the economy for once?”

It would have been, but the temple-mosque debate has often ousted all other ideas.

With Ashish Mishra