Ram Mandir-Babri: Every temple, mosque is to be protected, Rajeev Dhavan

Senior Advocate Rajeev Dhavan attacked the test of comparative significance employed by the Supreme Court in its 1994 judgment in Ismail Faruqui v. Union of India for deciding the significance of a place of worship to a community..Arguing before the Bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices Ashok Bhushan and S Abdul Nazeer in the Ram Mandir–Babri dispute in the Supreme Court, Dhavan submitted,.“Every temple, mosque, gurudwara, until the government decides to acquire it, is to be protected; There is no comparative significance”, he said..The Court is currently considering whether or not the law laid down by the Supreme Court in its 1994 judgment in Ismail Faruqui should be revisited by a Constitution Bench..In the said case, the Court had held that while offer of prayer or worship is a religious practice, its offering at every location where such prayers can be offered would not be an essential or integral part of such religious practice unless the place has a particular significance for that religion so as to form an essential or integral part thereof.”.Disputing the correctness of the judgment, Dhavan submitted yesterday that every place of worship of every religion is entitled to protection and comparative significance cannot be used to resolve inter-faith disputes..Dhavan placed heavy reliance on Justice BN Kirpal’s opinion in the TMA Pai Foundation judgment, quoting from that verdict,.“The one billion population of India consists of six main ethnic groups and fifty-two major tribes; six major religions and 6,400 castes and sub-castes; eighteen major languages and 1,600 minor languages and dialects. The essence of secularism in India can best be depicted if a relief map of India is made in mosaic, where the aforesaid one billion people are the small pieces of marble that go into the making of a map. .Each person, whatever his/her language, caste, religion, has his/her individual identity, which has to be preserved so that when pieced together it goes to form a depiction with the different geographical features of India.”.That a mosque has been destroyed does not mean that it ceases to be a mosque, Dhavan further argued..“A mosque is a mosque forever”, he said..He also relied on TMA Pai to assert that the state gives some special rights to minorities, just as parents pay more attention to a weak child..“Parents give more attention to a weak child so as to enable him/her to be stronger. Same is the case with preferential treatment to minorities.”.Turning his attention on the aspect of Ismail Faruqui which had held that offering prayer at every location where such prayers can be offered would not be an essential or integral part of religious practice, Dhavan submitted,.“Nobody, not even Your Lordships can say Muslims can pray anywhere. How many times, a Supreme Court or a Federal court has told people of a religion, ‘this is not your religion’….Religion has outward expressions. In Islamic faith, a Mosque is an outward expression.”.As the hearing drew to a close, Dhavan stated that there is a fear within the Muslim community that “what happened to this mosque could happen to any mosque”..The matter will now be heard on April 6..Read the order below..Image courtesy: Financial Express