Friday, Jul 05, 2002
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By Manas Dasgupta
The demolition of the 100-year-old Madni mosque in the Vasna locality was carried out by the municipal administration after serving a few hours' notice. The Congress mayor, Himmatsinh Patel, claimed that the municipal commissioner was acting under instructions from Gandhinagar and had issued the demolition orders keeping the elected representatives in the dark. he alleged that the demolition was part of the BJP Chief Minister, Narendra Modi's "plan to keep the city simmering till the next elections.'' With the Jagannath rath yatra scheduled for July 12, the demolition could provoke communal disturbances. The State Government authorities, however, denied any knowledge of the demolition which, a senior Minister said, was carried out by the municipal corporation. He ridiculed the idea of the municipal commissioner taking orders from Gandhinagar and said the Congress was blaming the Government to save its own skin. The mosque was in the eye of a storm for causing obstruction to traffic. With the growth of the city, the busy Ashram Road, one of the main city arteries, was expanding all along its stretch but stopped at the Madni mosque, a part of which jutted out on the road. The mosque, along with nine shops adjoining its boundary wall, was damaged by hooligans during the recent riots. Repair work had just been taken up by the trust when the municipal bulldozers demolished it. The agitated Congress members had planned to call on Mr. Modi in Gandhinagar but later decided to wait till the return of the municipal commissioner, P.M. Paneervel. The city Congress president, Rajkumar Gupta, who is also the chairman of the corporation standing committee, said the deputy municipal commissioner had told him that the demolition orders were issued by Mr. Paneervel, who however, denied any knowledge of the incident. Mr. Gupta said the mosque was demolished in violation of an earlier civic resolution that no place of worship would be demolished on grounds of traffic obstruction, but that the existing ones would not be allowed to expand or new ones allowed to come up creating traffic obstructions.
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