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A mosque within the collectorate office campus in Uttar Pradesh’s Saharanpur that was declared illegal was demolished on Saturday morning. A large police force was deployed during the operation.
The administrative action follows a September 2 ruling by a local court, which dismissed an appeal by the mosque management committee against the City Magistrate’s July order declaring the masjid unauthorised and ordering its eviction.
The mutwali (custodian) of the mosque, Tanveer Ahmed, alleged that the action was carried out without due process.
Claiming that the mosque is approximately 150 years old, Ahmed said, “The city magistrate passed an eviction (Bedakhli) order in July, directing that the premises be vacated within 30 days. We challenged the order before the court of the district judge, which dismissed our petition on September 2. There was no order for demolition, yet the structure is being demolished today.”
However, City Magistrate, Saharanpur, Kuldeep Singh told The Indian Express that demolition began around 6.45 am so that the work could be completed early, adding that the entire building has now been razed and debris is being cleared.
Explaining why the structure was demolished when the order pertained to eviction, he clarified that his order had directed “Bedakhali”, which he explained as removal of the premises, and that the building had accordingly been removed from the site.
This story was originally published in indianexpress.com. Read the full story here.
