‘We should not call any disputed structure a mosque’, says UP CM Adityanath

Any disputed structure should not be called a mosque, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath said on Friday.

“The day we stop calling it a mosque, people will stop going there,” he said at an event organised by news channel Aaj Tak in Prayagraj. “Hurting anyone’s faith by constructing a mosque-like structure does not align with Islamic principles. Worship at such sites is not acceptable to god too.”

Islam does not mandate the construction of a structure for worship, the chief minister said. “But Sanatan Dharma does,” he added.

Sanatana Dharma is a term some people use as a synonym for Hinduism.

The statement by the Bharatiya Janata Party leader comes amid increasing lawsuits by Hindu parties claiming ownership of mosques and dargahs.

On December 12, the Supreme Court barred trial courts from passing orders, including survey directions, in pending lawsuits concerning the religious character of places of worship.

It also said that no new suits can be registered in any court across the country until further orders while it hears a clutch of petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the 1991 Places of Worship Special Provisions Act.

The Act does not allow any changes to the religious character of a place of worship as it existed on August 15, 1947.

On Friday, Adityanath said that while “sanatanis go to…

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