After Gyanvapi Case Order, Asaduddin Owaisi Says "We Will be Back to '80s"

Asaduddin Owaisi of AIMIM said, "I was hoping that the court will nip these issues in the bud. Now it appears that more such litigations will be coming and this is going the way the Babri Masjid legal issue went"

Asaduddin Owaisi, the chief of AIMIM (All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen) today said the order of the Varanasi court allowing a petition from some Hindu women for year-long worship in the premises of Varanasi's Gyanvapi mosque should be challenged in the High Court. "I was hoping that the court will nip these issues in the bud. Now it appears that more such litigations will be coming and this is going the way the Babri Masjid legal issue went," he told NDTV in an exclusive interview hours after the verdict.

The court of District judge AK Vishvesha ordered today that a petition of five Hindu women seeking permission to conduct rituals inside the mosque premises through the year, will be heard. The court also made it clear that plaintiffs were not asking for a conversion of the premises and their suit "is limited and confined to the right of worship as a civil right, fundamental right as well as customary and religious right".

The contention of the Muslim petitioners that it would lead to instability, has no merit, said the judge, who was specially handed the case by the Supreme Court earlier this year.  

The top court had said given the "complexity and sensitivity" of the dispute, it requires experienced handling.