COLOMBO: The Masjidul Khaira mosque at Dambulla in Central Sri Lanka, which was threatened with destruction by a group of Buddhist agitators last Friday, is not an authorised construction as claimed by the Sri Lankan Prime Minister D M Jayaratne and the Buddhist monk Venerable Inamaluwe Sumangala Thero, but a legal one with a deed dated 1964, says Asad Sally, chairman of the Islamic Solidarity Front (ISF).
Sally told Express here on Tuesday that he could even show a copy of the deed to the media. On Sunday, Jayaratne had said that the mosque should be shifted to a place outside the Rangiri-Dambulla Buddhist “sacred area” and that a suitable place would be provided by the government.
But the Muslims, cutting across party lines, said in one voice that they would not allow any shifting because the mosque was not an unauthorised construction.
The Muslims rejected the contention of the Ven Inamaluwe Sumangala Thero that in an area declared as “sacred” for the Buddhists, houses of worship of other religions could not be built.