Sant Samiti leader demands tight security during survey

VARANASI : Akhil Bharatiya Sant Samiti general secretary Swami Jeetendranand Saraswati on Wednesday demanded tight security arrangements to ensure that there is no interruption in the survey of Maa Shringar Gauri Sthal on May 6.

He also sought action against SM Yasin, the joint secretary of Intezamia Masajid Committee which manages the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi, for his allegedly “provocative” statement in the matter.

On April 30, Yasin had said the committee would peacefully oppose the order of the local court to conduct an inspection, videography and survey. “We will not allow anyone to enter the mosque for videography and survey. The managing committee of the Gyanvapi mosque will oppose this decision of the court,” Yasin had said.

“This decision will be opposed constitutionally,” he had added.

Addressing a press conference in Varanasi, Swami Jeetendranand Saraswati claimed that it would not be the first time the complex would be surveyed. In 1937, the then civil judge of Banaras SB Singh had inspected the mosque complex and its surroundings not once but twice, he said.

The first inspection was done before the hearing of the concerned case and the second before the judgment was pronounced. In the same case, the British government produced two experts, historian Paramatma Saran and historian A.S. Altekar, as witnesses in the court. Both of them also surveyed and studied in detail the Gyanvapi mosque complex.

Saraswati said that this matter cannot be settled without the survey of the Maa Shringar Gauri Sthal.