Supreme Court to hear pleas challenging provisions of Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act on Friday

New Delhi: The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on Friday six pleas challenging the validity of certain provisions of the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991. The petitions are listed for hearing before a bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and Aniruddha Bose. The apex court will examine the petitions filed by retired army officer Anil Kabotra, advocates Chandra Shekhar and Rudra Vikram Singh, Devkinandan Thakur Ji, Swami Jeetendranand Saraswati, and former Bharatiya Janata Party MP Chintamani Malviya.

Kabotra has challenged the constitutional validity of sections 2, 3, and 4 of the 1991 Act contending that they violate the principles of secularism.

"By making the impugned Act, Centre has arbitrarily created an irrational retrospective cut-off date, declared that character of places of worship shall be maintained as it was on August 15, 1947, and no suit or proceeding shall lie in court in respect of disputes against encroachment done by barbaric invaders and lawbreakers and such proceeding shall stand abated," said the plea, filed through advocate Ashwani Kumar Dubey.

The 1991 provision is an Act to prohibit conversion of any place of worship and to provide for the maintenance of the religious character of any place of worship as it existed on August 15, 1947, and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

Several other pleas, including the one filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhyay, challenging the validity of certain provisions of the 1991 Act is already pending in the apex court.

The top court had earlier sought the Centre's response to Upadhya's plea challenging the validity of certain provisions of the 1991 law, which prohibit the filing of a lawsuit to reclaim a place of worship or seek a change in its character from what prevailed on August 15, 1947.

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