Debashish Mukerji, Associate Editor, The Week
Inexorably, relentlessly, the work goes on. Angry noises are periodically made elsewhere - in Parliament, in the media; angry noises subside. They barely reach the VHP karyalaya (workshop) at Karsevapuram in Ayodhya. And even if they do, they make not a whit of difference. A giant stone cutter has been whirring, chisel and hammer have been striking sandstone continually for nearly ten years. Less than two kilometres away stands the heavily guarded "makeshift temple" of Ram Lalla, upon the most controversy-ridden piece of land in the country. It is the spot where the chiselled stones are finally headed.
The workshop is crowded with huge blocks of pink sandstone, plinth slabs and intricately-carved pillars. These are the pieces the VHP and its sister organisation, the Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas, will use to build the much-talked-of "glorious temple to Lord Rama" on the spot where the Babari Masjid stood until December 6, 1992, and which the makeshift temple now occupies..
Added Champak Rai, key VHP functionary in charge of temple construction: "The intermittent furore raised in Parliament are really quite meaningless. If the opposition parties are so concerned about the work going on here, why did they not try to stop us when they were in power? We continued our work through all the years of the Narasimha Rao regime, as well as through the United Front rule which followed".
. Those who assumed that with the BJP putting aside its three 'contentious issues', including the construction of the Ram Mandir, the Ayodhya chapter had been brought to a close, could not have been more mistaken. The BJP may have sent Rama into permanent banwas (as a recent Organiser article commented) but not the VHP.
Right from September, 1990, when the workshop started, the building blocks of the proposed Ram temple have been prepared in deadly earnestness ...
"The Ram mandir will be a two-tier structure, and nearly half the work, almost the entire ground floor, should be over before the year end", maintained Anubhai Sompura, the Architect.
A miniature model of the proposed Ram temple stands enclosed in a glass case near the entrance to the workshop .... "At one extreme corner is the Singh Dwar, the entrance", he said. "Next to it is the Nritya Mandap ...
The third section, the Rang Mandap ...
The fourth section is a short passage, or Koli, leading into the heart of the temple, the Garb Griha, where, on the ground floor, the idol of Ram Lalla will be installed.
Above the Garb Griha will rise the towering temple spire to a height of 128 feet. Surrounding the entire structure, for circumambulation, will be the 10 feet wide parikrama, the entire area being 268.5 feet long, and 140 feet wide ...
With the workshop having grown extremely...crowded with the growing number of blocks and pillars, the VHP has purchased 22 acres nearby, to which its workshop will be extended. More living quarters for workers for also being built on the new site ...
But it is not enough to merely prepare the building blocks. The all-important site, too, has to be prepared for construction ... "First we shall fill up the pits and depressions in the area with stones and level the land with bulldozers", said Champak Rai. Then we shall building a 'raft foundation' - a six-foot-thick concrete layer over the entire area ... "
Can the VHP ever hope to gain possesion of the disputed spot? Although the Central government has acquired the entire area, the last Supreme. Court judgement ruled that the state could only act as a custodian, to hand the area over to its rightful owner once the title suit pending in the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court is disposed of. It cannot use the land as it likes or allot it to any party. But a judicial decision on the title suit, already pending for 50 years, is unlikely to be every reached ...
Until the court reaches a decision, or some other 'solution' is found, the near impregnable security at the disputed site, with its maze-like metal barricading, its watchtowers and searchlights and policemen, will remain ... Devotees ... come single file for their darshan, with policemen watching their every step. And even if, as on December 6, 1992, with the covert backing of the BJP government - which rules both in Lucknow and in Delhi -the VHP is able to defy court orders and storm the premises, the social and political fall out is bound to be catastrophic ...
But Champak Rai remained unperturbed. "Having started we are going to carry on", he said ... When we start will be decided by the Dharam Sansad." Are the VHP and the Nyas prepared to defy the court orders in force? Rai quoted Ramachandra Paramhans ... "Paramhansji said he would obey court orders only if they were in consonance with dharma. My view is the same", he said ...
The tantalising question then arises: will the country soon see a sequel to the great Ayodhya drama, the first part having ended on December 6, 1992? "In every major movement, there are lulls and peaks", VHP leader Ashok Singhal has said ... So will it be with the Ayodhya-movement.
More than seven years have gone by: when will the next phase begin? Ayodhya is rife-with stories of how the VHP intends to build a mass movement again on the issue of temple construction, just as it had done on the matter of demolition. However much it may embarrass the ruling BJP, VHP sources feel, the Central government is unlikely to take repressive measures against a member of its own RSS Parivar. The state government's attitude ... is likely to be much more conciliatory.
The first step for the VHP, sources aver, will be to set up the ground floor of the temple, initially not at the disputed site, but upon the land recently purchased by the VHP. "We want to test out whether the temple is structurally all right", maintained the VHP source. But the real purpose, it is claimed, is to use the starding, half-build temple to rouse popular feeling in favour of temple construction ... "We hope the interim structure will mobilize the masses again, after which we will make our assault on the disputed site". (Source: The Week, 5 March, 2000)
B. Premanand On Babari Masjid Question
The concept of God is that he is the creator of the Universe, Omnipotent, Omniscient and Omni-present.
Rama is believed to be the 7h Avatar (incarnation) of Vishnu ... It is significant that he did not care for his own Janmabhoomi Temple ... Why did Rama allow Babar to destroy his temple at his birth place and ... to build Babari Masjid?
We are wondering why gods need the help of their followers to protect them and save them from the onslaughts of other religions ...
When god is believed to be omnipresent how could he be locked in places of worship? Our sincere advise to VIIP, BJP and Babari Masjid Committee is that if there gods are all powerful ... they (should) leave the matter to their gods instead of trying to protect them and their religion (and) do not play with the peace and harmony of the people of our country (and) turn our country into bloodshed. instigating the people to mass hysteria and destruction. (Source: The Indian Skeptic)
Shahabuddin's Response to The Indian Skeptic, 13 December, 1999
I have seen your brief article on Ram Janambhoomi and Babari Masjid issue.
I know you are an atheist. But as a theist, I believe that the Omnipotent, Omniscient and Omnipresent God Operates not through godmen and miracles but through the laws of nature and the free will of Man. So, I can understand the origin of human conflict, including aggression against other religions.
When the Sangh Parivar demolished the Masjid, we were not praying.for angels to come down and save it. We were mobilising the political, judicial and legislative systems and the people, but the demolition squad proved itself to be more powerful than the Constitution or the Taw. As Shri V.P. Singh very correctly said: "They demolished not the three domes of the Masjid but the three domes of governance - the legislature, the judiciary and the executive". What irks me is your false equation hetween the offenders and the defenders; between the Sangh Parivar and the Babari Masjid Movement.
In you judgement, should the Babari Masjid Movement surrender to the blatant violation of the rule of iaw and not even take peaceful, legal steps for exposing the culprits and regaining the Masjid?
