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A High Court in India Recognizes Yet Another Disputed Site as a Hindu Temple

The Bhojshala complex in Madhya Pradesh houses a temple dedicated to the Hindu goddess Saraswati, and also a mosque associated with a medieval-era Sufi saint.

The exterior of the Kamāl Maula Mosque in the Bhojshala complex at Dhar in Madhya Pradesh, India, as seen from the south-west, as photographed by the Archaeological Survey in about 1924.

When India became independent in 1947, it inherited a range of unresolved communal issues. Foremost among them was the “disputed identity” of several historical structures, which both Hindus and Muslims claimed as their own. These places of worship included medieval era mosques that were allegedly built over ancient Hindu temples, triggering contested claims and even communal riots.

The most contentious of these structures was the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya, built by Mughal emperor Babur in the 16th century, which Hindus claimed was the site of the birthplace of the Hindu god, Ram. After the mosque was pulled down by Hindutva mobs in 1992, India’s Supreme Court, in its verdict of November 9, 2019, cleared the way for the construction of a Ram temple at the disputed site. A grand Ram temple was subsequently inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 22, 2024.

It set the precedent for the “templing” of other such mosques with contested claims, the most recent instance being the Bhojshala temple associated with the Hindu goddess Saraswati in Dhar in central India’s Madhya Pradesh, where the Kamal Maula Mosque associated with the medieval-era Sufi saint Kamal-al-din Chishti is also located.

On May 15, the Madhya Pradesh High Court declared the 11th-century complex to be a Hindu temple dedicated to Vagdevi (Saraswati, the goddess of learning) and rejected claims of the Muslim side that it was a mosque.

Drawing on a recent scientific study by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), the High Court ruled that the original structure dated back to King Bhoj, a Rajput ruler who ruled the erstwhile Malwa region in central India. Bhoj established a Sanskrit teaching center, the Bhojshala, with a temple in it. The Bhojshala complex is recognized as a “protected monument” under the ASI.

With this ruling, the court struck down the 23-year-old ASI order of 2003, permitting shared use, i.e., with Muslims offering namaz on Fridays and Hindus worshipping at the site on Tuesdays. Additionally, Hindus were permitted to celebrate Basant Panchami (dedicated to the goddess Saraswati) at the temple. This arrangement was done after several violent clashes erupted between the two communities over the years, especially when Friday prayers coincided with the Basant Panchami festival.

While analyzing the “religious character” of the structure, the Madhya Pradesh High Court judges said that the mosque had been built with parts of an earlier Hindu temple.

Interestingly, under medieval Sultanate rule, with the mosque coming up on the site, structures in the complex displayed both Hindu and Islamic elements: Hindu temple pillars, inscriptions, and motifs alongside Islamic mihrabs or arches.

Expectedly, the Muslim community that has been praying at the mosque for close to 700 years has challenged the recent High Court ruling. Political commentators have pointed out that the court ruling brazenly flouts the Places of Worship Act, 1991, a law that helped to maintain the status quo on religious places since Independence. Enacted in order to freeze the frequent contentious claims by both Hindus and Muslims over medieval religious sites, the Places of Worship law seeks to maintain communal amity and protect the character of religious sites as they existed on August 15, 1947, the day India became independent. It also forbade lower courts from taking up such matters for adjudication. Among the few mandated exceptions was the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya, which was already embroiled in legal judicial proceedings.

Over the centuries, the Indian subcontinent witnessed several invasions, including that by Muslims – the Delhi Sultans, the Mughals, among others – who, during their rule, built mosques at the site of existing or older Hindu temples. Expectedly, the majority of such structures show remnants of ancient Hindu temples. Muslims have been worshiping in these mosques for centuries.

While tensions have simmered in some such sites as at the Gyanvapi Mosque in Varanasi, in other places, both Hindus and Muslims have worshiped side by side. Post-2014, when the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) under Narendra Modi came to power playing the Hindu majoritarian........

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