‘Hindu’ site adjacent to Varanasi’s Gyanvapi mosque surveyed 

Caretakers oppose move to conduct videography inside the mosque in Varanasi

A team of lawyers and opposing legal parties led by a court-appointed advocate commissioner on Friday conducted a videographic survey of the Maa Shringar Gauri site located at the back of the western wall of the Gyanvapi Mosque in the Gyanvapi Masjid-Kashi Vishwanath Temple Complex in Varanasi.

The survey was initiated after a local court recently appointed court commissioner Ajay Kumar Mishra to inspect the site, videograph it and submit a report.

The videography would continue on Saturday. Apart from the court commissioner and his assistants, the five plaintiffs and their lawyers, videographers and five members from the Muslim side were part of the survey.

While the court order did not specifically state if the survey would include videography inside the Gyanvapi Masjid, its caretakers expressed concern and asserted that they objected to any videography inside the mosque.

Civil judge (senior division) Ravi Kumar Diwakar had appointed the court commissioner after one Rakhi Singh and four other plaintiffs last April filed a suit declaring that they were entitled to have daily darshan, pooja and perform all the rituals of Maa Shringar Gauri, Lord Ganesh, Lord Hanuman and other “visible and invisible deities within old temple complex” situated at settlement plot no. 9130 in the area of Dashwamedh ward and police station

The plaintiffs had submitted that at the back of the western wall of the mosque, there existed an image of goddess Shringar Gauri since time immemorial. The plaintiffs had also demanded that the caretakers of the mosque be restrained from imposing any restriction, creating any obstacle, hindrance or interference in performance of daily darshan, pooja, aarti, bhog and observance of rituals by devotees of goddess Maa Sringar Gauri at the site of Lord Adi Vishveshwar along with Lord Ganesh, Lord Hanuman, Nandi and other deities.

Along with the suit, they moved an application for appointment of an advocate commissioner to make a local inspection of the site and ascertain the existence of the images of deities Maa Shringar Gauri and others at the plot.