Election Dispatch: In PM Modi's Varanasi, Muslims Are Being 'Pushed To The Edge'

68-year-old SM Yasin is a busy man. The Joint Secretary of the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid Committee, he represents the Muslim side in several temple-mosque disputes across India, including the Gyanvapi Mosque-Vishwanath Temple case in Uttar Pradesh's Varanasi.

"We don't have faith in the judiciary anymore. The courts these days are giving judgments and not justice," Yasin said as he prepared for a hearing in the case, sometime in April 2024 — in the middle of India's ongoing seven-phase general election.

He was referring to an order given by a local Varanasi court on 31 January, which allowed Hindus to offer prayers at the basement of the Gyanvapi mosque.

"The district judge was to retire on 31 (January). And just a few hours before that he passed this judgment. Overnight the Supreme Court mandated barricading was also removed. And then, the Commissioner himself sat and performed the prayers along with his son. Now if something happens in the city, who do we go to?" Yasin questioned as he flipped through the case files.

In his voice was, anger, mixed with a sense of despondency.

Varanasi, in eastern Uttar Pradesh, is the parliamentary constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who in now eyeing a third term from the seat. Fighting against Modi are Ajay Rai of the Congress party and Athar Jamal of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).

Election in the Shadow of a Temple-Mosque Dispute

It was late April and India had already voted in the first phase of the ongoing general election. And the Assi Ghat, one of Varanasi's most famous ghats, had transformed into a set for live television news.

On particular show on a national Hindi news channel, spokespersons of the BJP, Congress, and BSP were discussing religion, politics, Ram Temple, and elections in Varanasi.

Sita Sahu, 41, sat in the audience, in the front row. Towards the end of the programme, the anchor asked Sahu a question about 'vikas' or development in Varanasi under Modi. "I can't even begin to tell you how much the city has progressed in the last 10 years. This Assi Ghat, where we are standing has become a tourist spot. Earlier, nobody came here because of how unkept it was. And then, let me talk about women..." Sahu said when she was interrupted by a group of angry students from the Benaras Hindu University (BHU), also present in the audience.

"I was a special invitee to the programme," Sahu, a petitioner for the Hindu side in the Gyanvapi dispute, later told The Quint.

She is among five women who filed a petition in a Varanasi trial court in August 2021 asking for restoration of their right to perform rituals in the Gyanvapi mosque. They claimed that the mosque held “Hindu gods Maa Shringar Gauri, Lord Ganesha, Lord Hanuman and other deities”.

"When I was a child, my father told me that several temples including the temple of Baba Vishweshwar, Ayodhya's Ram Janmabhoomi, and the one in Somnath were demolished and mosques were built over them. That is what motivated me to file this case. Before this we were only allowed to pray to Nandiji once a year. We wanted to fix that," Sahu said.

The Court Case: A Brief Timeline

For centuries, the Gyanvapi Mosque and Vishwanath Temple, sitting beside each other in the heart of Varanasi, have attracted pilgrims and tourists of all faiths from all across the world.

The dispute came into focus in 1991, a year before the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. A petition was filed before Varanasi civil judge on behalf of Swayambhu Jyotirlinga Bhagwan Vishweshwar and five others seeking removal of Muslims from the Temple complex and the demolition of mosque.

The petitioners had claimed that the mosque was built on the orders of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb by demolishing a part of the Kashi Vishwanath Temple during his reign in the 16th century.

In 1997, however, the Varanasi Civil Court said that the suit was not maintainable under the Places of Worship Act, 1991. The Act froze the status of religious places of worship as they existed on August 15, 1947, and prohibits the conversion of any place of worship and ensures the maintenance of their religious character.

After this, both the Hindu and the Muslim sides approached a District Court and filed several revision petitions.

In 1998, the District Judge merged all the petitions and ordered the civil court to adjudicate the dispute afresh after considering all evidence. But the High Court stayed the Varanasi district court order. The stay continued for 22 years with the High Court continuing to extend it.

The more recent developments in the case started in 2019 after the Supreme Court verdict in the Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi title dispute.

Several new petitions were filed. In one, a Varanasi-based lawyer Vijay Shankar Rastogi, who identified himself as the "next friend" of Swayambhu Jyotirlinga Bhagwan Vishweshwar, filed a petition in the lower court claiming illegality in the construction of the Gyanvapi mosque and sought an archaeological survey of the mosque.

Another case was filed by Sita Sahu, along with four other women, seeking permission of the court to conduct daily prayers at “a shrine behind the western wall of the mosque complex” and protection of the idols. 

Following development in these cases, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) submitted its report to the court in December 2023.

on 21 January 2024, the court ordered that this report be made public and provided to both sides. One week later, on 31 January, Hindus were allowed to perform prayers in the basement of the mosque.

The Fight Outside The Court

Days after prayers were allowed in the basement of the mosque, a video of Roshan Pandey, State Secretary of the Hindu Samaj Party, went viral on social media. In the video, Pandey, along with a few others for pasting the sticker of a temple instead of a mosque on the Gyanvapi Mosque signboard.

A case was registered against Pandey on charges, including inciting religious sentiments. That, however, did not bother him much.

"When I pasted that sticker, some officials came to me for questioning. I told them that I only did what our honourable Chief Minister has said. A statement by CM Yogi Adityanath is viral where in very clear words he stated that calling Gyanvapi a masjid is controversial and will give birth to a dispute. It is a temple and will always be a temple. So, if it is a temple why did the signboard call it a mosque?" Pandey questioned.

He added that his organisation is fighting the Gyanvapi battle outside the court, "Many Hindus here are not aware of their faith. They don't know about historical injustices unleashed on our religion. We organise events and use social media to help them learn about what these people (Muslims) did to us. We also fight against love jihad and forceful conversions."

SM Yasin, however, said that the fight Roshan Pandey's Hindu Samaj Party and other groups are fighting targets and dehumanises Muslims.

"Teen nahi tees hazaar, nahi bachegi ek bhi masjid ya mazaar (We will reclaim 30,000 mosques and mazaars) – this is their slogan. This slogan is raised near the mosque every day. Several such slogans are raised...ek dhakka aur do, Gyanvapi ko todd do (Push once more, let's demolish the Gyanvapi). WhatsApp forwards comparing us with animals and insects are circulated on a daily basis. But what can we even do? We're tolerating this," he told The Quint.

'If There's a Dispute, Settle It in the Court'

Both Sita Sahu and Roshan Pandey believe that Varanasi has seen immense development under the Modi government. "Ever since this mandir was constructed and the Vishwanath Dham was built, at least 2 Lakh tourists come to Kashi everyday. This has given a boost to the hotel and other industry including the Benarasi saree industry. Is that not generating employment? Are the autowallahs and other people involved in these industry not getting employment?" Pandey claimed.

But the reality on ground does not support Pandey's claim. The situation is especially grim for Varanasi's Muslim weavers. Ishrat Usmani, a social worker closely associated with the weavers' community told The Quint, "The bunkars (weavers) in Varanasi, who make the world famous Benarasi sarees, which played a big role in the Indian economy and the economy of Varanasi, they are being forced to migrate. There are a lot of reasons behind this. On one hand, cheaper, machine-made sarees are taking over, and on the other hand, there is hardly any support from the government."

Yasin added, "Faith and religion is not an election issue here. Unemployment and jobs are. Even common Hindus are facing these problems. Today, bhakts are happy that Muslims are being troubled. But do they not know that if Muslims are being troubled today, tomorrow they will also face the same?"