No need for Dhannipur mosque, says Ayodhya case litigant Iqbal Ansari

Mr. Ansari pushed for farming on the five acre land instead allotted for the mosque, suggesting that the crop produced should be distributed among Hindus and Muslims

After the Indo-Islamic Cultural Foundation (IICF), set up by the Sunni Central Waqf Board to oversee the construction of the proposed Dhannipur mosque in Ayodhya, dissolved its committees, including one meant for the shrine’s development, with the project being hit by a severe fund crunch, Iqbal Ansari, son of the oldest litigant in the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid case Hashim Ansari and himself a previous litigant on Saturday targeted the foundation for doing nothing productive for construction of the mosque. The proposed mosque suffered due to inner politics being played.

“More than four years passed by but U.P. Sunni Central Waqf Board and the foundation failed to do anything apart from only showing proposed Mosque layout and again changing it, only politics have been done in the name of constructing the mosque. They [IICF] failed to collect donations,” Mr. Ansari told The Hindu. 

He suggested that there is no need of a mosque in Dhannipur as multiple mosques exists since long and pushed for farming on the five acre land allocated to the trust, adding that the crop produced in land should be distributed among Hindus and Muslim, signalling unity between communities. “Multiple mosques exist in Dhannipur locality since decades, hence there is no need for a new mosque. People are able to offer prayers in existing mosques located in Dhannipur. In contrary, farming should be done on the five-acre land and produced crop should be distributed between Hindus and Muslims which would signal unity between communities,” Mr. Ansari added. 

In November 2019, the Supreme Court permitted the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya, at the site where the 16th century Babri Masjid once stood. In the same order the SC asked the government to allot a suitable five acre plot in Ayodhya to the Sunni Central Waqf Board, to construct a mosque. The Sunni Central Waqf Board later formed the IICF to oversee the construction of the mosque on the five acres of land in Dhannipur. In 2023, the proposed mosque got a new name and design after objections from a section of Muslim community regarding its ‘contemporary’ conceptualisation.

Published - September 21, 2024 07:27 pm IST