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| Photo Credit: The Hindu
The Supreme Court on Wednesday (August 12, 2026) indicated that it may send the plea regarding which lawsuit will be the lead case in the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Idgah mosque dispute back to the Allahabad High Court.
A bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Sanjeev Sachdeva said notices were not issued to other plaintiffs by the High Court, which treated another Hindu party, in another suit, as a representative of all devotees of Lord Krishna.
“The application was for something else, and notices were not issued to all the plaintiffs. We, in any case, are inclined to remand the matter back to the High Court,” it observed.
The apex court posted the matter for further hearing on September 2.
During the last hearing of the matter, the bench said, a statement was made across the bar by some counsels that off-the-record talks were going on between plaintiffs (Hindu parties) on whose lawsuit will be the lead case in the matter.
Senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for some Hindu parties, urged the court to remand the matter back to the High Court for deciding the issue afresh.
The top court was hearing a plea of a Hindu party in the matter challenging a 2025 Allahabad High Court order, which treated another Hindu party, in another suit, as a representative of all devotees of Lord Krishna.
The top court is seized of multiple petitions filed by the mosque committee and Hindu sides against various orders, including a challenge to the May 26, 2023, order of the High Court transferring to itself all matters related to the dispute pending before the Mathura court.
On July 18 last year, the High Court allowed another Hindu party, which had filed a separate suit seeking the removal of the Shahi Idgah mosque from the disputed site in Mathura, to be treated as the representative of all devotees.
The High Court allowed an application moved by the plaintiff in the suit titled number 17 of 2023 to treat his case as the representative one of all other suits in the dispute. After this, suit number 17 will be treated as the representative suit and will be heard and decided first, the High Court had said.
The aggrieved Hindu party moved the apex court and said his suit was treated as the lead case after all civil suits in the dispute were transferred to the High Court but the High Court erred in treating another party as the representative of all devotees.
The dispute is related to the Shahi Idgah mosque, which the Hindu side claims was built by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb after demolishing a temple at the birthplace of Lord Krishna in Mathura.
Over 20 civil suits were filed in a Mathura court, which were later transferred to the High Court and are pending adjudication before it.
The Hindu side had made a prayer before the High Court that it should conduct the original trial as it did in the Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi title dispute.
The top court, on January 16, 2024, stayed the operation of the December 14, 2023 order of the High Court, which allowed a court-monitored survey of the Shahi Idgah mosque complex and agreed to the appointment of a court commissioner to oversee it.
The complex is located adjacent to the Krishna Janmabhoomi temple, a site of significant religious importance for Hindus.
Published – August 12, 2026 05:04 pm IST
