File photo used for representation.

NEW DELHI: Claiming that the court-mandated mediation for amicable settlement of the vexed Ayodhya dispute is “not likely to yield any result”, one of the parties representing the Hindu community on Tuesday sought scrapping of the process and pleaded the Supreme Court to adjudicate the case pending since 2010.

Senior advocate P S Narasimha, appearing for litigant Rajendra Singh, mentioned the petition before a bench headed by CJI Ranjan Gogoi which has agreed to hear the plea. The plea bases its view on the alleged futility of mediation on the experience of the litigant participating in the process which, he said, does not seem to be going anywhere.

On March 8, a five-judge bench of the apex court had appointed a three-member panel headed by retired SC judge F M I Kalifulla and comprising renowned mediator and senior advocate Sriram Panchu and spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. It had asked the panel to get opposing parties to the negotiating table to try and resolve the 70-year-old litigation relating to ownership of the 2.77 acre Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid land in Ayodhya. The court had in May extended the time till August 15 for the panel to complete proceedings.

The petitioner is a successor to one of the litigants who had initiated the legal battle way back in 1950 by filing a case before a civil judge for permission to worship the deity at Ayodhya. Singh argued that he is now about 80 years old himself and is still awaiting the final outcome of the litigation instituted by his father Gopal Singh Visharad.

“Since the mediation proceedings ordered by this court are not yielding any fruitful result or likely to yield any result, it is most respectfully submitted that mediation proceedings be declared to have been concluded and the appeals filed by the applicant herein and others be heard on merit and decided expeditiously,” the application said.

The plea said suggestions had been made that are not even within the scope of the present mediation in any way and were political in nature. “This has convinced the applicant herein that mediation would not yield any fruitful result and the only solution is judicial adjudication,” the application said.

“It is most respectfully submitted that despite initial reluctance in the process of mediation, the applicant herein whole heartedly participated in the mediation proceedings conducted by three eminent persons appointed by this court,” Singh said. He said the meetings over five months have not resulted in any concrete proposal nor has any headway been made in the process of mediation.

The appeal, challenging the Allahabad HC decision to divide the 2.77 acre disputed land equally among Ram Lalla (deity), Nirmohi Akhara and Sunni Wakf Board, has been pending in the SC since 2010.

