What is Places of Worship Act cited by Muslim side and why it is under scrutiny amid Sambhal Masjid and Ajmer Sharif Dargah cases?

New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh’s Sambal has been among news ever since 5 people were killed in shooting incident after violence erupted over the survey of the Mughal-era Shahi Jama Masjid.

The survey became ordered by a native court after claims were made that a Hindu temple once stood at the websites of the Jama Masjid.

The survey became being conducted less than the supervision of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). After this incident, a court in Rajasthan’s Ajmer on Wednesday, November 27 issued notices to the Union ministry of minority affairs and ASI on a lawsuit filed by a Hindu organisation laying claim to the websites of the dargah of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti, citing historical evidence of the existence of a Shiva temple there and the dargah became built over the Shiva temple.

Following this, few Muslim organisations stepped forward and referred to the Places of Worship Act, 1991. As many as four petitions hard the Places of Worship Act, 1991 are submitted in the Supreme Court.

What's Places of Worship Act, 1991?

The Places of Worship Act states that the spiritual character of any place of worship, as it existed on August 15, 1947, should be preserved.

Its long title describes it as “An Act to prohibit conversion of any place of worship and to produce for the maintenance of the spiritual character of any place of worship as it existed on the fifteenth day of August, 1947, and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.”

Section three of the Act bars the conversion of places of worship, declaring that “no person shall convert any place of worship of any spiritual denomination or any section thereof right into a spot of worship of a special component to the identical spiritual denomination or of a special spiritual denomination or any section thereof.”

The law fixed August 15, 1947 as the closing date for status quo on the character of non secular places.

When became the law introduced?

In 1991, the then Congress government less than Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao introduced the Act in Parliament. The bill became introduced when the Babri Masjid dispute became at its peak. The Congress brought the bill with an aim to introduce communal cohesion and forestall future clashes. It became then opposed by the BJP. Notably, the Babri Masjid dispute failed to fall less than the Bill’s ambit since the matter became already sub-judice at the time.