The Supreme Court has deferred hearing the petition seeking to push back the verdict in the Ayodhya title suit dispute on September 24. A Bench of Justices Altmas Kabir and A K Patnaik said: “It is a civil suit. We have no jurisdiction over it.” The Bench directed the matter to be listed before the appropriate Bench. Earlier in the day - and with just two days left for the verdict on Ayodhya title suit dispute -the petition seeking the deferment of the Ayodhya verdict was admitted in the Supreme Court. The application was moved by retired bureaucrat Ramesh Chand Tripathi and the demand to defer the verdict was admitted under Section 89 of the Civil Procedure Code. He said the verdict could flare up communal tension and that both the central and state governments were ill-equipped to handle a law-and-order situation because of the pressures of the Commonwealth Games, the Bihar elections and the floods. Tripathi approached the apex court five days after a three-judge Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court rejected his petition to defer the verdict and allow mediation to find a solution to the 60-year-old Ram Janambhoomi-Babri Masjid title suit dispute. The High Court had also imposed “exemplary costs” of Rs 50,000, terming Tripathi's efforts for an out-of-court settlement of the dispute as a “mischievous attempt”. The application, which sought some time to allow mediation, also challenged the costs of Rs 50,000 imposed on him. In his petition before the High Court, Tripathi had claimed that verdict might disturb communal harmony and lead to violence in the country. He had referred to an earlier order of the court on July 27 that parties concerned are at liberty to approach the officer on special duty to form a Bench if there was any possibility of disposing the dispute or arriving at an understanding through consensus. The court had, however, rejected the application terming it as “mischievous” and “an attempt to obstruct the verdict”. One of the three judges in the Lucknow Bench, however, disagreed with the majority order rejecting the plea for deferring the Ayodhya verdict to allow mediation and gave a dissenting opinion that an amicable settlement could have been explored. Justice Dharam Veer Sharma while not concurring with the view of the other two judges – Justice S U Khan and Justice Sudhir Agarwal – also said in his dissenting judgement he wasn't consulted when the three-judge Bench gave the order while dismissing the plea for mediation. Tripathi's petition had contended that rejecting his appeal was illegal since one judge was not consulted.
