Key Principles Adopted By The Court In The Ram Janmabhoomi Case

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Updated: 04-04-2024

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Those who are interpreting the judgment through a minority or majority lens have observed majoritarian bias in the verdict. Many critics believe that the verdict is based on “faith and not the rule of law,” since the Muslim side was given a plot elsewhere and the Hindu plaintiffs were granted the disputed site. However, the verdict’s supporters have expressed satisfaction that it has resolved a dispute that had been simmering since 1855 (the case’s legal origins date back to 1885). They contend that it was the problem’s most sensible solution.

Key principles adopted by the court in the Ram Janmabhoomi case

Equity and complete justice: While considering a case that was fundamentally contentious, unstable, and unresolvable, the five-judge bench went beyond reaching a unanimous decision to invoke the just and equitable principles of equity and equality before the law. The Supreme Court used the Indian Constitution’s article 142, which guarantees “equity,” or complete justice, to award Muslims the five-acre plot. However, the court also used the principle of equality before the law and “evidence of actual worship down the centuries” to grant Hindus possession of the disputed site. The principles of justice, good conscience, and equity have long been employed by Indian courts to supplement the inadequacies or inapplicability of the written law with the actualities of legal disputes, thereby providing justice to all parties involved.

Continuous worship: Not because they are the majority or minority, nor because of their faith, the Hindu community was granted the “site,” while the Muslim community was given a five-acre plot. This is because the Supreme Court found evidence of “actual worship down the centuries.” The court reasoned that although Ram Lalla Virajman and the Sunni Central Waqf Board had competing claims to the disputed site, the Hindu attorneys ‘evidence of continuous worship was stronger than the Muslim attorneys’.

Adverse Possession Law: The Supreme Court clarified the legal requirements for the ‘adverse possession’ doctrine, stating that the aggressor must prove ‘possession which is peaceful, open and continuous’. The Muslim parties’ legal representative was unable to produce any proof that namaz was said at the mosque or a record of ownership for the three centuries following the building of the Babri Masjid in 1528. Though the Uttar Pradesh Sunni Central Waqf Board, the original Muslim claimant, had been claiming the title for the disputed site since 1961 on the grounds of adverse possession, the counsel for the Sunni Central Waqf Board failed to present the necessary evidence that satisfied the legal principle of ‘adverse possession’.

The lost grant doctrine: The theory of lost grant was one of the supporting arguments put forth by the Sunni Waqf Board’s legal representative about the assertion of continuous possession of the contested land. According to this theory, extended and continuous use or possession indicates a loss of the conveyancing instrument and a prior legal assumption that the user had the right to use the property. The requirement that possession be continuous for a sufficient period is the only convincing evidence supporting the doctrine’s applicability. The highest court ruled that there would be no assumption of a lost grant if the recipients of the grant were not identified.

The omission of Nirmohi Akhara: The five-judge bench notes in the judgment’s introduction that the Supreme Court was entrusted with resolving a dispute “whose origins are as old as the idea of India itself.”The Supreme Court reversed the Allahabad High Court’s 2010 three-judge bench ruling that divided the disputed site between the Sunni Central Waqf Board, Ram Lalla Virajman, and Nirmohi Akhara. The Nirmohi Akhara and the Shia Waqf Board had their petitions dismissed by theSupreme Court’s ruling.

Rule of law vs. faith and belief: The Supreme Court rendered its decision based on the principles of title and evidence, not faith and belief, characterizing the installation of idols in the Babri Masjid in 1949 as an “act of desecration” and the demolition of the mosque in 1992 as “illegal.”

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