Highlights of SC judgment in Ayodhya case

The following are the highlights of the Supreme Court judgment wherein it declined to set up a larger bench for a re-look of its 1994 verdict which held a "mosque is not an essential part of the practice of Islam", paving the way for the apex court to hear the politically sensitive main Ayodhya title suit.

* A Muslim group had assailed the observations made by a five-judge Constitution bench in 1994 in the Ismail Faruqui case.

* In a majority verdict of 2:1, Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Ashok Bhushan say earlier observation was made in the limited context of "land acquisition".

* Observations were neither relevant for deciding the suits nor for deciding these appeals.

* No case has been made out to refer the Constitution Bench judgment of this Court in Ismail Faruqui case for reconsideration.

* SC says has to find out the context in which the five-judge bench had delivered the 1994 judgement.

* Justice S A Nazeer, the third judge, dissented with the majority view.

* He said the question whether mosque was essential part of the religion cannot be decided without a "detailed examination of the beliefs, tenets and practice of the faith" and favoured reconsideration of the issue to a larger bench.

* Justice Nazeer said the questionable observation of 1994 verdict had permeated into the Allahabad High Court's decision in land dispute case.

* He held that the larger bench should decide whether the test for determining the essential practice is both essentiality and integrality.

* Civil suit on land dispute will be heard by a newly constituted three-judge bench from October 29.