The Varanasi district court on Wednesday allowed Hindus to offer prayers at the southern cellar of the Gyanvapi Masjid in the city, marking a decisive turn in the decades-old dispute that will have reverberations not only on a raft of linked suits over the shrine but also in similar petitions over a mosque in Mathura.

District judge AK Vishvesha granted the family of a late priest the right to resume prayers in the southern cellar of the mosque after three decades, saying that the petitioner Shailendra Kumar Pathak Vyas and a priest appointed by the Kashi Vishwanath trust, which manages the temple next door, will be allowed to enter the premises.

Prayers — which were last offered in December 1993 — will have to resume within the next seven days, added the judge, whose last working day was Wednesday.

“District Magistrate, Varanasi/Receiver is directed to get pooja, Raag-bhog of the idols in the cellar, the property in question, on the south side of the building situated at Settlement Plot No. 9130, Thana Chowk, District Varanasi, done from the plaintiff and the priest named by the Kashi Vishwanath Trust Board,” the court said in its order.

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The order is a victory for Hindu petitioners who asked for the rights to pray in the cellar – one of four in the complex, all sealed right now – and expressed apprehension that the mosque committee might illegally annex it. If the prayers go ahead, this will be the first time in three decades that any Hindu rituals are conducted inside the mosque complex, fulfilling a longstanding ideological goal of Hindu groups.

It is also a shot in the arm for other Hindu petitioners who argue that the mosque was built by Mughal emperors after demolishing a temple and seek rights to the complex.

Vishnu Shankar Jain, a counsel for Vyas, said, “This order allows daily prayers, and is a major win for us.”

The court fixed February 8 as the date to hear the objections of the Anjuman Intezamia Masajid Committee, which manages the 17th century mosque. But the committee said it will challenge the order in the high court.

“We will challenge the order in the Allahabad high court,” said advocate Akhlaque Ahmad, representing Anjuman Intezamia Masajid Committee.

READ | Timeline of Gyanvapi case: What happened and when

The four-page verdict represented yet another setback for the mosque committee, which has, so far, unsuccessfully argued that the Hindu suits were barred by the 1991 Places of Worship Act, which locks the religious character of shrines as they existed on August 15, 1947, with the exception of the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute.

The verdict comes roughly a week after the same judge furnished a copy of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) report on the same complex. The ASI survey conducted a study of architectural remains, exposed features and artefacts, inscriptions, art and sculptures, to conclude that there existed a Hindu temple prior to the construction of the Gyanvapi Masjid. The mosque panel has already disputed the timelines indicated in the report and said it will study the survey before taking legal steps.

The Vyas family of Varanasi, a family of priests, was considered the hereditary owners of the southern cellar of the mosque, where prayers to Ganesha, Hanuman, Nandi and other deitieswere conducted by Somnath Vyas, the maternal grandfather of the petitioner. At the time, the entrance to the mosque was towards the front of the building, and the Hindu deities could be accessed by devotees from another gate in the rear.

But in the aftermath of the Babri Masjid demolition in December 1992, authorities feared a law-and-order problem and sealed all four cellars of the mosque. Permanent barriers raised were also erected at the time. The last time the prayers were offered were in December 1993.

In September this year, the Vyas family first approached a Varanasi local court, saying the district magistrate should be appointed and that they be allowed to pray in the cellars.

On September 25, 2023, Shailendra Kumar Pathak Vyas filed a plea in the court of civil judge (senior division), urging the court to appoint the district magistrate or any suitable person nominated by him as the receiver of the cellar and a direction to the receiver to allow the plaintiff, co-pujaris and devotees to perform puja there.

Simultaneously, Vyas filed an application in the Varanasi district court, urging it to transfer the matter to itself. The Varanasi district court on October 19, 2023 transferred the civil suit to itself.

In his submissions, Vyas alleged that the mosque committee kept visiting the cellars and might take it over. Ahmad called the allegation baseless.

He prayed to the court to allow him to offer puja in the cellar as this was the practice till it was barricaded in 1993.

The plaintiff said that as hereditary pujari, he should be allowed to enter the cellar — also known as Vyas ka taykhana — and resume puja.

Vishnu Shankar Jain, one of Vyas’s lawyers, said that he asked the court to allow the plaintiff to perform puja in the cellar and create an entry gate for the space.

“Till December 1993, Vyas ji’s family members performed puja of the deities in the southern cellar of Gyanvapi. Then, all of sudden, the local administration directed to stop the pooja at the cellar in 1993, an order that was in place till now,” said advocate Subhash Nandan Chaturvedi, one of counsels representing Vyas.

Ahmad argued that the plea was barred by the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991. “The cellar is part of the Gyanvapi mosque. So, worship could not be performed. Therefore, puja should not be allowed,” Ahmad argued.

On January 17, the Varanasi district court appointed the district magistrate as the receiver of the cellar, directing him to keep it safe and not allow any change.

On January 24, a district administration team led by additional district magistrate Prakash Chandra completed the proceedings in connection with the district magistrate becoming the receiver of the cellar.

The development will have wide ramifications across similar suits filed by Hindu groups and petitioners in Mathura and Agra – all part of what experts have called the new temple movements, where Hindu groups and individuals have approached lower courts to file petitions seeking legal solutions to decades-old religious disputes, instead of using street mobilisation to push for change.

In all cases, Hindu petitioners argue that medieval-era Islamic structures were built by demolishing temples and demand praying rights. The Muslim sides reject the contention and say that any such legal action violates property and religious laws, including the 1991 Act.

Varanasi, Mathura and Ayodhya are part of a decades-old ideological project by Hindu groups who argue that medieval-era Islamic structures were built by demolishing temples and demand rights over those structures. The Supreme Court paved the way for the Ram Temple in Ayodhya in 2019, and the Mandir opened on January 22 in an ideological win. Cases by Hindu groups and individuals in Varanasi and Mathura are currently being adjudicated in courts across Uttar Pradesh, even as a larger challenge to the Place of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991 is being heard by the Supreme Court.