The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed as many as 32 intervention applications in the Ayodhya Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri dispute case. Among the applications dismissed by the apex court were those submitted by Shyam Benegal, Aparna Sen and Teesta Setalvad.
The top court accepted a plea that only original parties to the Babri Masjid-Ram temple title dispute be heard while interventions of unrelated people be rejected.
A plea of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Subramanian Swamy, seeking to intervene in the case, was also rejected by the top court. The court, however, ordered the revival of Swamy's disposed plea that had sought enforcement of his fundamental right to worship at Ram Temple in Ayodhya.
The Supreme Court heard a batch of petitions against the Allahabad High Court verdict in the Ayodhya dispute. Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra and two other judges – Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice S Abdul Nazeer - have been hearing a total of 13 petitions over the disputed site in Ayodhya.
A special bench of the top court headed by CJI Misra had earlier asked both the parties before the Allahabad High Court to file the English translation of documents exhibited by them.
The apex court had also directed its registry to provide copies of video cassettes, which were part of HC records, to parties on actual cost. The bench said that it would hear the appeals on March 14, 2018, and clarified that it never intended to hear the case on a "day-to-day basis".
The bench had also added that it would deal with the instant matter as a "pure land dispute". The special bench of the apex court is seized of a total 14 appeals filed against the high court judgement delivered in four civil suits.
A three-judge bench of the Allahabad HC, in a 2:1 majority ruling, had in 2010 ordered that the land be partitioned equally among three parties - the Sunni Waqf Board, the Nirmohi Akhara and Ram Lalla.
(With agency inputs)
