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Shia Central Board of Waqf U.P. v. Sunni Central Board of Wakf

Special Leave Petition (Civil) · 2019 INSC 1232Decided 9 Nov 2019
Special Leave Petition (Civil) Diary No. 22744 of 2017
Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi · Justice S.A. Bobde · Dr. Justice D.Y. Chandrachud · Justice Ashok Bhushan · Justice S. Abdul Nazeer

Background

This Special Leave Petition sought to challenge a civil court judgment from 30 March 1946 passed by the Civil Judge, Faizabad: a matter connected to the long-running Ayodhya dispute over the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site. The petition was filed decades after that 1946 judgment.

Decision Breakdown

The five-judge bench (the same bench that had decided the main Ayodhya title suit) found an "inordinate delay of 24,964 days", roughly 68 years, in filing the Special Leave Petition against the 1946 judgment, and held that this delay had not been adequately explained. On that short ground alone, the petition was dismissed.

Lesson Learnt

Courts will not entertain challenges filed with extraordinarily long, unexplained delay, regardless of the historical or public significance of the underlying dispute: timely litigation matters as much as the merits.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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