By TwoCircles.net staff reporter,
Mumbai (Maharashtra): It has been there for the last thirty seven years in the Pratikcha Nagar locality of Goregaon area in Mumbai. Known as Aqsa Mosque, it is registered with Khwaja Muinuddin Chishti Madarsa Trust. But of late, the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC), in connivance with Slum Rehabilitation Area (SRA), is planning to demolish it, alleges the trust officials.
The trustees of the madrasa have alleged that they have been getting warnings of the demolition of the mosque. According to the madrasa authorities, BMC has asked them to prove that it is a mosque. The BMC thinks it is a madrasa building and is planning to demolish it, as the trustees alleged.
Earlier this area used to be shanty, but now under the planning of SRA buildings have replaced them.
Another special feature of this area is that Hindus and Muslims have been living together here in complete harmony. That is the reason that there are four temples in the compound where the mosque stands. Hindus and Muslims have been regularly visited their religious places for worship. Here people from different faiths respect one another’s faith and religious sentiments.
But the controversy created around the existence of the mosque has disturbed the otherwise very peaceful social environment of the area.
Reacting to the sinister design of the local authorities, local residents cutting across faith barriers gheraoed the office of the Assistant Municipal Commissioner on 25th of June 2008.
Both Hindu and Muslim residents of the area have clarified in written to the municipal corporation that the mosque has been at its present site since last thirty seven years, and it is registered.
But when BMC was contacted, it denied that it had ever planned to demolish the mosque. The Assistant Municipal Commissioner of the BMCP, P.B. Kolekar said that it was an enquiry on the legal and registered status of the mosque after the SRA’s request.