Gyanvapi Survey Day 2: ASI Conducts Scientific Survey of Mosque Complex, to Continue on Sunday
According to ASI officials, the team examined the central hall of the mosque where Namaz is offered. The team also surveyed a few basement areas in the complex
Day two of the scientific survey of Varanasi’s Gyanvapi mosque picked up during the morning hours of Saturday. Unlike the previous day when the focus of the 61-member team of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) was on measurement and photography/videography of the structure, on Saturday they inspected the three domes of the Gyanvapi mosque. The team examined the central hall of the mosque to determine if the 17th-century mosque was constructed over a pre-existing structure of a Hindu temple.
For the first time on Saturday, the Anjuman Intezamia Masajid Committee–the Muslim side in the case of Shringar Gauri-Gyanvapi extended support to the survey of the barricaded area of the Gyanvapi mosque.
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Government counsel Rajesh Mishra, who was with the ASI survey team a day before as well, said the team started work in the morning and completed it by 5 pm. The survey work was stopped between 1 pm to 3 pm for lunch.
ASI officials told news agency PTI that the survey work will resume again at 8 am on Sunday.
According to ASI officials, the team examined the central hall of the mosque where Namaz is offered. The team also surveyed a few basement areas in the complex.
The ASI team divided itself into four parts and closely studied the Mosque’s architecture, especially the design of the three domes of the Gyanvapi mosque.
“As the court has clearly stated that no damage to the structure shall be done, nor any mud or mortar samples to be taken, we are trying to study the architecture. On the same lines, we have also studied the domes, the shape of the dome, the carving and the stucco work on the walls of the barricaded area of the Gyanvapi mosque," said Madan Mohan Yadav, senior counsel representing the women plaintiffs of the Hindu side in Shringar Gauri-Gyanvapi case.
Yadav said the ASI is likely to open the basement area of the mosque that has been lying locked since its inception.
However, in the backdrop of the ongoing survey, the Varanasi district court has reserved an order on the application of ASI urging the court to give additional four weeks’ time to submit a report on the Gyanvapi mosque’s scientific survey that resumed amid tight security on Friday, a day after the Allahabad high court vacated a stay and gave the go-ahead for the exercise.
Standing government counsel, Government of India, Amit Kumar Srivastava filed the application on behalf of ASI, urging the court to give four weeks’ time for completion of the survey and report submission.
“We urged the court to give four weeks’ time to the ASI for submitting a report in terms of the order dated July 21, 2023, which has been affirmed by the order of the Allahabad high court dated August 3, 2023," Srivastava said.
“The court admitted our application, urging the court to grant four weeks’ time to the ASI for submitting the report," he added. Srivastava said that after hearing the matter, the court reserved its order for August 5.
The Varanasi court had ordered the survey on July 21 and asked for the submission of the report by August 4. In compliance with that order, the ASI had conducted the survey for over four-and-a-half hours on July 24 after which the Supreme Court the same day (July 24) halted the exercise till 5 pm on July 26 and granted liberty to the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee, which manages the Gyanvapi mosque to approach the Allahabad high court.
When the mosque committee moved the high court on July 25, it extended the stay on the survey. The high court gave its ruling on August 3 and allowed the exercise to go ahead. The masjid committee then moved the Supreme Court against the high court order but the top court refused to stay the survey on Friday.
(with inputs from PTI)
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