Mumbai: In response to an upcoming February 21 court hearing regarding an archaeological survey of the Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti Dargah in Ajmer, Rajasthan, Muslim groups are aiming to collect ten million signatures to oppose the claim that the shrine sits atop a destroyed Shiva temple.
The Ajmer Civil Court will hear the petition filed by the Maharana Pratap Sena, claiming that the shrine—built by Mughal emperor Humayun over the tomb of the Sufi saint who died in 1236 CE—is the site of a Hindu temple. The court will also hear an application by the Dargah trust on the same day.
Rajvardhan Singh Parmar, president of the Maharana Pratap Sena, said that the organisation collected signatures from 1.25 lakh Hindus in support of the claim during the Jan Jagran Yatra in Rajasthan in 2022. "The Maharana Pratap Army has been demanding for a long time that an investigation should be conducted into the Dargah located in Ajmer because that Dargah, in reality, is not a Dargah but a Hindu temple. We had sent a letter to the Congress government on this matter, but the anti-Hindu Congress government did not take it seriously," said Parmar, who has also petitioned Rajasthan Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma.
This is the second petition in the dispute by a Hindu organisation. In November 2024, Vishnu Gupta of the Hindu Sena filed an application in court, claiming that the Dargah was built over the Sankat Mochan Mahadev Mandir in a place called Ajay Meru, which later became Ajmer.
Parmar has asked the government to start an archaeological study of the Dargah in Ajmer, similar to the investigations carried out in Ayodhya and Varanasi. When asked why he filed a petition while a similar application was already being heard, Parmar noted that more than 100 applications were filed in the Krishna Janmabhoomi case. "In the Ayodhya Ram Janmabhoomi case, too, there were several petitions. We are with the other petitioners. In fact, we want more people to file petitions. This is not my personal fight; it is a fight by an entire community," said Parmar.
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The Hazrat Khwaja Gareeb Nawaz Welfare Committee has filed an application in the Supreme Court, claiming that the two petitions in the Ajmer Civil Court violate India’s Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991. The Act prohibits the conversion of any place of worship and provides for the maintenance of the religious character of any place of worship as it existed on 15 August 1947. Sahil Hussain, secretary of the organisation, said they have 36,000 signatories for the petition. "The admission of the two petitions by the Ajmer court violates the law," said Hussain.
The organisation stated that politicians cannot be trusted to lead the opposition against the petitions in the Ajmer court and that the community must take the lead in saving the shrine.
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