Supreme Court to take up mediation panel’s Ayodhya report today

New Delhi: The three-member mediation panel on Ayodhya dispute headed by former Apex court judge Ibrahim Kalifulla has submitted its interim  report in a sealed cover to the Supreme Court which will take up the matter on Friday.

A five judge Constitution Bench comprising Chief justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justices S.A. Bobde, D.Y. Chandrachud, Ashok Bhushan and Abdul Nazeer had on March 8 appointed a mediation panel which included Spiritual Guru Sri  Sri Ravi Shankar and mediation expert advocate Sriram Panchu to explore the possibility of arriving at a permanent and lasting solution.

The panel was  granted eight weeks to mediate the highly sensitive Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid land dispute case  to facilitate an out-of-court settlement to the more than seven decades old dispute. The panel held ‘in-camera’ proceedings and restrained the media from printing or telecasting the mediation proceedings.

In tomorrow's hearing the Bench is to decide whether mediation efforts can continue or not and this would depend on the panel.s report. If the panel says that the dispute  could  be amicably resolved through further mediation, the court is expected  to give more time to complete the process. If the report says it is a futile exercise then the Bench will  proceed with the hearing of the appeals on merit. 

The Bench is hearing a batch of 13 appeals against an Allahabad High Court verdict in the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid title suit relating to the disputed site in Ayodhya.