Safe evaluation of Gyanvapi ‘Shivling’: Allahabad HC grants ASI time till April 5 to file reply - Hindustan Times
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Safe evaluation of Gyanvapi ‘Shivling’: Allahabad HC grants ASI time till April 5 to file reply

ByJItendra Sarin, Prayagraj
Mar 21, 2023 11:26 PM IST

Expressing displeasure over delay in the filing of a counter affidavit (reply) by the Archaeological Survey Of India (ASI), the Allahabad high court on Monday (March 20) granted one more chance to it to file its response by April 5—the next date of hearing— to clarify whether the carbon dating of the object (purported Shivling) found inside the Gyanvapi mosque could damage it or safe evaluation of its age can be done

Expressing displeasure over delay in the filing of a counter affidavit (reply) by the Archaeological Survey Of India (ASI), the Allahabad high court on Monday (March 20) granted one more chance to it to file its response by April 5—the next date of hearing— to clarify whether the carbon dating of the object (purported Shivling) found inside the Gyanvapi mosque could damage it or safe evaluation of its age can be done.

The court also directed the trial court at Varanasi, where this case is pending, to fix date in the trial after April 5, 2023. (HT file)
The court also directed the trial court at Varanasi, where this case is pending, to fix date in the trial after April 5, 2023. (HT file)

The petitioners — Laxmi Devi and three others — have filed the present civil revision petition, challenging a Varanasi court order that had rejected the demand for carbon dating and scientific determination of the purported ‘Shivling’ found during a court-mandated survey of Gyanvapi mosque premises on May 16, 2022.

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Earlier, on January 19, 2023, the court had granted eight weeks’ time to the ASI to file its response. However, on Monday, the counsel for the ASI sought more time to file its response, as according to him, the ASI has to take advice from other agencies as well.

Expressing displeasure over the delay in filing of ASI’s response, Justice Arvind Kumar Mishra-1 observed, “The time extension application has already been given in the garb of obtaining advice from other agencies. Further time should not be sought by the ASI, as the ASI may take advice as it thinks appropriate by embarking upon process which would expedite the matter because the issue on merits has been kept pending since long for obtaining report of the Archaeological Survey of India and for which the time extension application is working against interest of justice and it should not be allowed to go on any further from April 5, 2023”.

However, the court also directed the trial court at Varanasi, where this case is pending, to fix date in the trial after April 5, 2023. Earlier, on November 21, 2022, the counsel for the ASI had made an oral submission before the high court, stating that the ASI was still contemplating with its experts as to what methods could be adopted to determine the age of the purported ‘Shivling’.

In view of it, he had sought further time of three months to submit ASI DG’s opinion as to whether a safe evaluation of the age of the purported ‘Shivling’ could be done by adopting a scientific methodology. The petitioners have challenged a Varanasi court’s October 14, 2022 order rejecting Hindu worshippers’ plea for conducting a scientific probe of the ‘Shivling’.

On November 4, the high court had sought the response of the ASI in the matter and directed the ASI DG to submit his opinion whether investigation of the said structure, if examined through carbon-dating, ground-penetrating radar (GPR), excavation and other methods adopted to determine its age, nature and other relevant information, was likely to damage it or a safe evaluation about its age could be done. Carbon dating is a method of calculating the age of very old objects by measuring the amounts of different forms of carbon in them.

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