SHC seeks property documents of Mari Mata Mandir

Petitioners claim temple has been illegally occupied

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) has directed the relevant mukhtiarkar to submit documents related to the ownership of the property of a Hindu temple, Mari Mata Mandir, from where taziya is taken out every year during Muharram.

Headed by Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah, the two-judge bench also summoned Lakshmi Bai, who is accused of illegally occupying Mari Mata Mandir located in Akbar Market. Justice Helpline, a non-governmental organisation, had approached the court seeking custody of the worship place of the Hindu minority.

The petitioners said that Mari Mata Temple, which is located on plot 303-B at Sister Sequeira Street in the Rattan Talao on Akbar Road, is a historic worship place of the Hindu community.

After riots broke out in the city in 1992, following the demolition of Babri Masjid in India, Bai had saved the temple by placing a taziya there, recalled the petitioners. Bai, who converted to Islam after the 1992 riots, is now illegally occupying the property, they alleged. They added that Bai was not allowing community members to visit the temple and to worship there.

Therefore, the petitioners pleaded the court to order the authorities to retrieve the temple from the private respondent and hand it over to the Hindu community to look after it and perform their religious duties there.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 30^th, 2016.