Protests broke outside the Supreme Court yesterday after the newly formed Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi adjourned the hearing in the Ram Mandir case till January 29.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDAKD5q65UI] The hearing in the Ram Mandir case was adjourned once again after Justice U U Lalit who was on the Constitution Bench which was to hear the case the recused himself form the case. Justice Lalit withdrew from the case after advocate Rajeev Dhavan who represents a Muslim party in the case brought to the notice of the Court that Justice Lalit had represented former UP Chief Minister Kalyan Singh in a criminal case related to the dispute in 1994 when he was a lawyer. CJI Gogoi later announced that Justice Lalit had withdrawn from the case despite there being no relation between the merits of the Kalyan Singh case and the merits of the Ayodhya Case. A new Bench will now be constituted before the next hearing of the case at the end of the month.
The patience of people seems to be wearing out as the hearing in the case has been getting adjourned due to some reason or the other for a long time. Today when the hearing was adjourned again, a number of people gathered outside the Supreme Court to protest against the delay.
The court had adjourned the hearing in the matter till January 4 in October last year. On January 4, the court had said that the matter will be heard by an appropriate bench which will be constituted. On January 8, the court had formed a Constitution Bench to commence hearing in the case from January 10.