Ayodhya Ram Temple
Supreme Court's Ayodhya Hearing Delayed To January 29, 2019
The Ayodhya case will next be taken up on January 29, on account of Justice UU Lalit having earlier appeared as a lawyer in a related case. The Chief Justice of India, who is heading the 5-judge Constitution bench that has been constituted to hear the politically sensitive matter, clarified right at the start of proceedings that only a date and schedule were to be determined in the Thursday hearing.
Speaking immediately after, Rajeev Dhawan, senior counsel for one of the petitioners, highlighted that Justice UU Lalit had at one point been a lawyer in the associated Kalyan Singh case. Dhawan said, however, that he has no objection to Justice Lalit being on the bench but wanted to bring it to their notice.
To this, Harish Salve, appearing for the plaintiff Ram Lalla, said that Justice UU Lalit on the bench doesn’t impact the case because the case going on regarding Kalyan Singh was a criminal case regarding the Babri demolition and not on the merits of the Allahabad HC order.
However, Justice Lalit at this point decided to recuse himself from the case. Following this, the CJI said that the case will be taken up again on January 29 for further orders. The Supreme Court registry was also asked to submit a report when all the documents can be translated and the filings can be complete to begin hearing the case.