A suit seeking the appointment of a Commissioner to survey the Malali mosque to ascertain whether it was built on a Hindu temple, was ruled as maintainable by a Karnataka court. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s (VHP) plea to survey the mosque was approved by Mangaluru's Third Additional Civil Court, on Wednesday, November 9. Expressing the court’s ruling as a win for the Hindus, VHP leader Sharan Pumpwell said, “This is the first win for the Hindus. It (Malali mosque) is the temple of Hindus. We'll see what happens in the next court hearing. We are hopeful that the temple will be built there."

Hindu groups had alleged that a 'temple-like structure' was found at Assayed Abdullahi Madani mosque in Malali, Thenka Ulipady village, near Mangaluru during renovation, and had claimed to 'find the truth.’ The Malali mosque is a 700-year-old mosque and the purported temple-like structure was revealed after a renovation was carried out at the mosque. After the controversy erupted, a Karnataka court ordered the mosque management to stop the renovation work. The appeal by the mosque authorities to vacate the stay on renovation work was also rejected.

The VHP had sought a survey of the mosque in the same case. The mosque authorities claimed that it was Waqf property and therefore such a request was not maintainable. The original suit was filed by TA Dhananjaya and BA Manoj Kumar from Mangaluru before the Third Additional Civil Court. Dhananjaya and Kumar had approached the High Court of Karnataka stating the lower court should appoint the Commissioner instead of hearing arguments about the maintainability of the suit. The High Court on July 16 held that the lower court had the power to hear and decide on the maintainability of the suit. The mosque had submitted a petition to the court, arguing that the Waqf board was the rightful owner of the property and that the civil court should not hear the petition.

(With PTI inputs)