Gyanvapi mosque row: Meenakashi Lekhi urges Owaisi, Mehbooba Mufti to maintain social amity

Meenakashi Lekhi. File Photo

Union Minister Meenakashi Lekhi on Monday urged AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi and former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti to maintain peace and brotherhood on the Gyanvapi mosque issue, hours after a civil court in Varanasi issued orders to seal premises after a shivling was found inside a well in Gyanvapi mosque during survey today.

"I want to say to them (Asaduddin Owaisi and Mehbooba Mufti) to maintain peace and brotherhood and also suggest them to read history again. The matter is in the court, they should not interfere and disturb the environment," Lekhi said to ANI on the Gyanvapi mosque issue.

A civil court in Varanasi issued orders to seal premises after a shivling was found inside a well in Gyanvapi mosque during a survey today. The Supreme Court will hear the mosque panel's plea tomorrow against the Varanasi Court's order directing the survey. This decision came hours after one of the lawyers surveying the Gyanvapi mosque claimed that a shivling had been found in a well inside the premise, following which a civil court issued an order to seal the area and prohibit entry of people in the area.

On May 12, Varanasi civil court allowed the survey of the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi. Following this, Owaisi termed the Gyanvapi Masjid verdict a "blatant violation" of the Places of Worship Act 1991. As per the Act, "no person shall convert any place of worship of any religious denomination or any section thereof into a place of worship of a different section of the same religious denomination or of a different religious denomination or any section thereof."

He said that the court's decision is also a violation of the Supreme Court judgment given in the Babri Masjid title dispute."The order of the court is a blatant violation of the Places of Worship Act 1991. It is a violation of Supreme Court judgment given in the Babri Masjid title dispute," Owaisi told ANI.

Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti on Monday slammed the BJP-led Centre over the Gyanvapi Mosque row, and said that "they are after all our mosques". Addressing a press conference, Mufti said, "They are after all our mosques. They are after the Gyanvapi Mosque now. Our God is wherever we worship; give us a list of all mosques you are eyeing..."

"Would everything be okay when they take all of it?" she asked.

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