Supreme Court seeks Centre's response for opening places of worship

The Supreme Court on Wednesday sought a response from the Centre on a plea seeking to open all religious places of worship across the country which have been closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The bench comprising justices Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian said, "We are issuing notice just to explore the possibility." The proceedings were held through video conferencing.

A notice was issued to the Ministry of Home Affairs by a bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde on the plea of Ahmedabad-based "Gitarth Ganga Trust' seeking opening of the places of worship in the country. The plea was filed through lawyer Surjendu Sankar Das.

The plea said it has been filed with the "solemn and pious objective to protect the fundamental rights enshrined and guaranteed under the Articles 14, 19(1)(a) and (b), 25, 26 and 21, in particular, of the residents of India pertaining to the opening of the places of worship/religious places throughout India which have been prohibited/restricted at present by many of the states."

Meanwhile, the Maharashtra government on Tuesday told the Bombay High Court that opening of religious places is not a "practical" solution, even with guidelines in place and it has decided against it till the COVID-19 situation improves.

The state government was responding to public interest litigation (PIL) filed by a local NGO seeking direction that temples in the state be opened for worshippers.

The state also filed an affidavit in the high court on Monday, informing about its decision.

In the affidavit filed through Kishor Nimbalkar, the secretary of its Disaster Management department, the state government said past experiences, especially in cases of crowd management at "vegetable markets" or during the "Ganesh festival" had shown a rampant breach of safety guidelines.

"Opening of religious places with conditions or guidelines is not a practical solution," the state said, citing increased infections due to the opening of Balaji Temple in Andhra Pradesh.

The Tirupati temple had recorded more than 700 COVID positive cases among its staff since its reopening in June.

Many states have reopened places of worship including Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Gurugram among others.

(With agency inputs)