Will Yogi govt pursue Ayodhya case through Sunni Waqf Board?

FAIZABAD/AYODHYA: Sunni Central Board of Waqfs, the main claimant of the Babri Masjid tittle suit, is a part of Uttar Pradesh government that is going to be headed by chief minister Yogi Adityanath. The recipient of one-third part of the Masjid after the high court’s decision, Waqf Board is now fighting for the case in the Supreme Court.
In its manifesto, the BJP had announced that it would work for the construction of Ram temple on the Babri Masjid site “within the law”.However, now, the Uttar Pradesh government will have to fight the case from the side of Babri Masjid in the role of the Waqf Board.
The Board’s chairman and members are nominated by the government and it is also funded by the state government. All the moves in case of Babri Masjid, from filling the case of placing of idols in Babri Masjid to the demolition, have been taken by the Uttar Pradesh government in favour of the Masjid till now.
When the idols were placed on the intervening night of December 23-24 1949, the FIR was lodged by Uttar Pradesh government through Ayodhya Kotwal Ram Dev Dubey on the report of beat constable Mata Prasad.
In 1969, after the consent of Uttar Pradesh government, the Sunni Central Waqf Board had filed a suit in Faizabad court claiming the title of Babri Masjid.
“Digvijay Nath, the then-Mahant of Gorakhnath temple and leader of Hindu Mahasabha had engineered the placing of idols in Babri Masjid through local leaders in Ayodhya Mahant Abhiram Das and Mahant Ram Chandra Das Paramhans in 1949,” said Dhirendra K Jha, the author of ‘Dark Night At Ayodhya’.
“In 1991, when Kalyan Singh was sworn in as the first BJP chief minister of Uttar Pradesh after a sweeping majority by BJP on the Ram Mandir issue, the Waqf Board was fighting for the title suit of Babri Masjid. In the regimes of Rajnath Singh and Ram Prakash Gupta, the case continued,” said Mushtaq Ahmad, a senior lawyer who pleaded the case of Babri Masjid in high court.
Mahant Ram Das, the chief priest of Nirmohi Akhara, said, “If the state government takes the step of withdrawing Waqf Board from the case, it will open the way for the construction of Ram Mandir.”
Ranjeet Lal Varma, the lawyer for Nirmohi Akhara, a litigant from the Hindu side, said, “The government can do nothing unless any change in law of Central Waqf Act is made. It might bring some formula of settlement. If the government withdraws Waqf Board from the case, there are more Muslim parties fighting the case as appellants in Supreme Court.”
“We are ready for negotiation over this issue. Let the new government bring some formula in the light of Supreme Court’s full bench verdict of October 24, 1994. In that verdict, there is provision for both mosque and temple,” said Khaliq Ahmad Khan, a litigant in the Babri Masjid case.
“Will Yogi Adityanath allow the Waqf Board to stick to the claim of the title suit of Babri Masjid or will he withdraw the Board from the case? This is a big question,” said Iqbal Ansari, a litigant from the Babri Masjid side.