Thiruvananthapuram The Kerala high court on Friday ordered the state government to close down all religious places and prayer halls which are functioning without permission.
The single bench of justice P V Kunhikrishnan also directed Kerala chief secretary and state police chief to “issue a circular/order prohibiting change of a category of building to religious place and only in rarest of rare cases it can be allowed after obtaining a report from intelligence agencies ascertaining ground realities of that particular place.”
The court order came on a petition filed by a religious body Noorul Islam Samskarika Sangam seeking to convert a commercial building in Malappuram district to a place of worship. But the district collector refused to grant permission citing that 36 mosques were situated in five-km radius of the commercial building. Following this, the petitioner moved the high court which also agreed to the contention of the collector.The court observed that the “state has a large number of religious structures and halls and it is not necessary…a mosque is needed in every nook and corner”.
The court said, “the state, known as the God’s Own Country because of its peculiar geographical situation, is crammed with religious structures and halls.”
“We are exhausted with religious places and halls and we are not in a position to allow new religious places and halls except in the rarest of rare cases,” the court observed.
“If every Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Jews, Parsi devotee starts to construct religious places and prayer halls near their residence, the state will face serious consequences, including communal disharmony. It is a sensitive issue,” the court said adding though the Article 26 (A) of the Constitution ensures right to maintain religious institutions, it does not mean people can construct religious places everywhere.
The court also referred to a study on religious structures based on the 2011 census and termed it “alarming”.
According to the study the state has 10 times the number of religious structures as villages and 3.5 times the number of hospitals.
“If further religious places and prayer halls are allowed in Kerala without guidelines, there will be no place for the citizens to reside,” the court said.
During the hearing, the counsel for petitioner P Samsudin quoted certain verses from the Quran to buttress the importance of prayers for Muslims. Agreeing to the same, the court, however, remarked: “But, it is not stated in the verses of Holy Quran that mosque is necessary in every nook and corner.”
The judge also cited the famous song of late Malayalam poet Vayalar Ramavarma in which he spoke in length about how man created religion, religion created gods and together they divided the world and humanity.
“Let citizens love each other and follow their religious practices. They can do it from their house if their religion insists that. If the poet would have been alive today, I am sure he would have said that religion is the creator of religious places, instead of god,” the judge said.
