SC should have heard demolition case first, then Ayodhya title suit: Justice Liberhan

New Delhi: Chief Justice of AP High Court, Manmohan Singh Liberhan who headed the Ayodhya Commission of Inquiry, has said that the Supreme Court should have heard Babri Masjid demolition case first instead of Ayodhya title suit case.

The Supreme Court is to start final hearings in the Ayodhya title suit case from December 5. Liberhan had submitted a report in June 2009, wherein he had indicted Atal Bihari Vajpayee along, L K Advani and Murli Manohar Josh.

Liberhan spoke to The Indian Express and said: “The Supreme Court’s decision to hear the appeal in the matter of the Ayodhya title suit (the decision of the Allahabad High Court in 2010) on a day-to-day basis from December 5 will adversely affect the demolition suit. What is the point of doing this? If it is decided that it is Wakf property, then one side is established as guilty of demolition. And if the Hindu sides get it, then the act of demolition becomes seen as ‘justified’ — to reclaim own property. This demolition is known to people alive and must be decided first. They can take a few weeks or months to do it.”

The demolition suit is a criminal conspiracy case currently being heard in Lucknow against many including Advani, Joshi, Uma Bharti.

Slamming Allahabad High Court’s decision of partitioning the conflicted land into three parts, Chief Justice of AP High Court said: “The Allahabad High Court decision is not the answer. A decision had to be made on the title suit of the property and they went and partitioned the land.” The 2.33-acre land was divided between the main deity Ram Lalla, Sunni Wakf Board and Nirmohi Akhara.”

Liberhan said that ruling parties as well the Opposition, are both indifferent to the circumstances.

“None of the political parties today want to do something or even genuinely feel like they should do something on the demolition of the Babri Masjid. They just want to encash it in their own ways. In the present political environment, even the philosophical idea of imagining the so-called secular society is not there, it is just limited to sloganism,” he stated.