New Delhi:
After 40 days of the hectic hearing, Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi has planned a dinner with his four constitution bench colleagues - Chief Justice-designate SA Bobde, Justice Ashok Bhushan, Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice SA Nazeer - at luxury 5 star Taj Mansingh hotel in the national capital, sources say. According to a report in IANS, the Chief Justice wanted to be out along with the four judges giving them a break from the hectic schedule in the run-up to the judgment pronounced today.
Supreme Court backed the construction of a Ram temple at the disputed site in Ayodhya in a historic verdict on Saturday. In its 1,045 page long verdict, the Supreme Court settled the fractious issue between Hindus and Muslims that goes back more than 134 years. India's top court handed over the disputed 2.77-acre land to diety Ram Lalla and ruled that an alternative five-acre plot must be found for a mosque in a prominent place in Ayodhya. The apex court bench is headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi with Justices SA Bobde, DY Chandrachud, Ashok Bhushan and S Abdul Nazeer.
Justice Gogoi is due to retire on November 17.
Delivering a unanimous judgement on a case that has long polarised the country and frayed the secular tapestry of Indian society, a five-judge bench of the apex court headed by CJI Gogoi said the faith of the Hindus that Lord Ram was born at the site was undisputed. Yet, it is also clear that the destruction of the 16th century three-domed structure by Hindu karsevaks was a wrong that "must be remedied," the ruling said.
"The Constitution must ensure that a wrong committed must be remedied. Justice would not prevail if the Court were to overlook the entitlement of the Muslims who have been deprived of the structure of the mosque through means which should not have been employed in a secular nation committed to the rule of law," the judgement said.
To remedy that wrong, the court asked the government to allot a five-acre plot in a "prominent" location in the holy town of Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh for constructing a new mosque. The disputed 2.77-acre plot will for now remain with a Central government receiver, who will hand it over to a government-created trust that must be created within three months. The trust will be tasked with the construction of the temple.
