A priest designated by the Kashi Vishwanath temple performed prayers at a cellar known as ‘Vyas Ji Ka Tehkhana’ inside the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi on Thursday after a district court ordered the local administration to unseal the premises which was sealed in 1993 on the orders of the then Samajwadi Party-ruled Uttar Pradesh government.
Acting swiftly to ensure the compliance of the court order, District Magistrate (Varanasi) S. Rajalingam reached the disputed site on Wednesday along with senior police officials. He ordered the removal of barricades placed outside the cellar and reviewed the necessary arrangements needed to be done to perform worship at the spot.
“The court order has been complied with,” Mr. Rajalingam told The Hindu.
The order was given by now retired district judge Ajay Krishna Vishwesha on his last working day. The judgment came while hearing the application filed by one Shailendra Kumar Pathak, priest of Acharya Ved Vyas Peeth temple, in September 2023, which had sought worship of visible and invisible deities in the basement of the mosque.
Pictures from inside the cellar showed giant stones placed evenly to make a platform over which a saffron cloth was placed. Pictures of Hindu deities, draped in red cloth, were placed on the platform, whose background too was covered with saffron cloth. The sides of the cellar looked dark. Electric wires were used to ensure proper lighting inside the basement.
According to reports, aarti was performed inside the cellar, five times a day. The entry of devotees inside the cellar is not allowed.
Editorial | Legitimising revanchism: On the Gyanvapi case and the Allahabad High Court
Gate installed
A senior police official involved in providing security arrangements at the mosque said both the police and PAC had been deployed at the mosque site to ensure law and order. A gate was installed around southern cellar doors.
The same gate was used by the devotees to get a partial glimpse of the small worship space created inside the basement. Beelines of devotees was seen making round of the mosque, cheering for the victory of Hindus.
While the administration managed to maintain peace in the city, some anti-social elements attempted to change the signboard of the Gyanvapi ‘mosque’ into Gyanvapi ‘temple’, which was later replaced by the police.
Pragya Pathak, Deputy Superintendent of Police, Dashashwamedh zone, said a case had been registered aainst unidentified persons and the police were trying to identify those involved in the incident.
Moves Supreme Court
Meanwhile, the Anjuman Intejamia Masajid Committee (that managed the Gyanvapi mosque) moved the Supreme Court on Thursday challenging the orders of the district court. The apex court, however refused to hear the matter on an urgent basis and asked the mosque committee to approach the Allahabad High Court.
As per the Supreme Court order, senior advocate SFA Naquvi mentioned the matter before the Acting Chief Justice Manoj Kumar Gupta in the High Court. Justice Gupta asked the lawyer to move the listing via registrar.
Multiple applications pertaining to the Gyanvapi mosque dispute are pending in the Varanasi district court in which Hindu plaintiffs have sought worship rights in the mosque. In one of the pleas, the plaintiffs have also sought the removal of the mosque. While dealing with one of the cases, the district court had ordered the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to conduct scientific survey of the Gyanvapi mosque to ascertain if there was a temple before building of the present structure. The ASI, in its report, maintained that there existed a large Hindu temple before the construction of the existing structure, that is the Gyanvapi mosque.
