New Delhi: A seven-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court is likely to consider the review petitions on the Sabarimala women’s entry case in January.
The assistant registrar of the apex court has sought four copies of the pleas and related documents. The officer has made it clear that the documents were sought for these petitions to be included in the list of cases to be taken up next month.
The review petitions of the Sabarimala case were earlier taken up by the five-member bench of the Supreme Court on November 14, 2019. However, it was decided to leave certain questions related to the freedom of religion for the consideration of a larger seven-judge bench.
These questions are on entry of Muslim women into mosques and dargah, issue of Parsi women's marriage, and the practice of female genital mutilation in Dawoodi Bohra community. One of the questions is on Sabarimala.
However, it is not clear whether the seven-member bench would consider all the cases at once. The Chief Justice of India can issue an instruction on this.
Nor is it clear whether the larger bench would just give answers to the questions raised by the five-member bench in November. Or pass an order on the review petitions against the Sabarimala verdict.
It is also possible that the larger bench would reply to the questions and return the review petitions to be considered by the 5-member bench again. A decision on the review petitions is likely to be based on the replies.
The pleas seek a review of the Supreme Court’s historic 2018 judgement that allowed women of all age groups to enter the Lord Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala.
Though the SC referred the review petitions to the large bench in November, it had not stayed the 2018 verdict.
