SC to hear plea on Ayodhya today

SC to hear plea on Ayodhya today

Press Trust of India / September 28, 2010,

Ruling out reconciliation, Sunni Central Waqf Board and Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha today said the Ayodhya title suit verdict by the Allahabad High Court should not be delayed further, as the Supreme Court prepared to hear tomorrow the plea to defer the judgment.

The submissions by the two key parties to the suit in separate affidavits before the Supreme Court came even as senior Congress leader and Union Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said contesting parties have to resolve the issue through discussions or accept court verdict.

Nirmohi Akhara, also a key party in the suit, said it would request the apex court for deferring the case for three months to help find a solution through negotiations.

After the High Court verdict due to have been pronounced last Friday was stayed the previous day for a week, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice S H Kapadia will tomorrow decide the fate of the special leave petition seeking postponement of the judgment.

The petition by a retired bureaucrat Ramesh Chand Tripathi wanted the possibility of an out-of-court settlement to be explored.

Mohammad Hashim Ansari(90), the oldest litigant and another main party, also wanted the verdict to be pronounced before October 1 - the date when one of the three judges in the High Court’s Ayodhya bench is due to retire.

Asked about the Centre’s stand on the 60-year-old dispute, Mukherjee said in Sagardighi in West Bengal, “the two contesting parties who filed the Ayodhya title suit have to resolve the matter among themselves through discussions. If it was not possible, then the court verdict has to be accepted.” Sunni Central Waqf Board’s Counsel Zafaryab Jilani said in Lucknow that an affidavit has already been sent in which a prayer has been made for pronouncement of the verdict by October 1 since one of the judges in the three-judge bench of the special full bench is retiring .

“The issue cannot be resolved through negotiations as the negotiations have not been able to bring about any result so far. It would be in the interest of justice that the high court may kindly be permitted to announce the judgement by October 1 as one of the judges is retiring on that day”, Jilani said outlining the prayer that would be made by Sunni Waqf Board and Hashim Ansari before the Supreme Court.

Both the parties would also cite some earlier attempts made for negotiation between 1986 to 2003, Jilani said.

Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha (ABHM) said it has decided to oppose the petition for mediation to find a solution to the Ayodhya suit and would press for the court verdict quickly.

“We have filed an affidavit in the SC today against the petition filed for deferring the verdict and to allow mediation to find a solution to the contentious dispute”, state president ABHM Kamlesh Tiwari said in Lucknow.

ABHM there was no chance of an amicable solution at this point of time.

Nirmohi Akhara’s counsel R L Verma said a prayer would be made before the Supreme Court for giving three months time for resolving the issue through reconciliation.

“It would be prayed that three months be given for resolving the issue through reconciliation and as for the retirement of one of the three judges in the three member bench of the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court, a prayer would be made for extension, he said.