Online Desk: Claiming that a 75-year-old mosque located in this Uttarakhand city has been built on unregistered land, members of some Hindutva outfits have demanded its demolition. But authorities have rejected their demand claiming that the mosque was legal.An official in the Uttarakhand police, citing district administration records, said the mosque was built on registered land.
Amit Srivastava, Superintendent of Police (SP), Uttarkashi, said: “Some right-wing organisations had given a memorandum to the administration, in which they stated that it is an illegal mosque. According to the district administration, it is built on registered land, and it is not illegal. It is registered in the name of four people. The administration has conveyed the same to the right-wing organisations.”
“We will not allow anybody to take the law into their hands”, Srivastava was quoted as saying in a Hindustan Times report on Wednesday.An umbrella group of right-wing organisations — SanyuktSanatanDharamRakshakSangh — submitted a memorandum to Uttarkashi District Magistrate Meharban Singh Bisht on Monday demanding the demolition.
The organisation members held a public demonstration outside the DM office on Friday pressing for their demands with a three-day deadline.During the protest, speakers gave an ultimatum to the administration and threatened to carry out the demolition themselves if authorities did not act as per their demand.
“This mosque will be demolished. This is my appeal to the Hindu organisations that we will have to carry out this demolition. If the administration does not agree to demolish it, we will have to do it,” said a speaker amid chants of ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
A video of the protest has surfaced on social media. In the video, the protesters can be heard shouting provocative slogans “Mullokerakhwaleko, baharnikalsaaloko” (Bring out the protectors of Muslims). They also raised slogans calling for the demolition of the mosque.