New Delhi: Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi on Tuesday set up a 5-judge Constitution Be-nch headed by himself to hear the Ayodhya title case from Thursday. The other judges on the Bench are Justices S A Bobde, N V Ramana, U U Lalit and D Y Chandrachud. He has thus reversed the ruling by his predecessor Dipak Misra, just five days before retirement on September 27 not to send the case to a Constitution Bench but continue the hearing by a 3-judge Bench.
The notice on setting up of the Constitution Bench was put on the court’s website and said that the petitions in the Ayodhya land dispute will come up in Court No 1 at 10.30 AM on January 10. On January 4, when the case came up before a 2-judge Bench headed by the CJI, it had said further orders would be passed on January 10 by the “appropriate Bench.”
Pending before the Apex Court are 14 petitions against the 2010 Allahabad High Court judgment, splitting 2.77 acres of land in Ayodhya among three parties — the Sunni Waqf Board, the Nirmohi Akhara and Ram Lalla. On September 27, a 3-judge Bench had refused by a 2:1 majority to refer the matter to a five-judge constitution bench for reconsideration of the observations in its 1994 judgment that a mosque was not integral to Islam.
Many saffron organisations, led by the RSS, have been demanding an Ordinance for an early construction of the Ram Temple at the disputed site, but Prime Minister Modi shot down the demand in a January 1 televised interview, saying he will better wait for completion of the judicial process. Let the judicial process be over. After the judicial process is over, whatever be our responsibility as government, we are ready to make all efforts,” he had said.
