On The Demolition of the Babri Masjid

I AM happy to hear that People's Democracy, our weekly paper is bringing out a special edition on the tenth anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. I wish to place on record what I remember about that shameful event which sent shock waves not only through India, but throughout the world. Once before, on October 30, 1990 when Mulayam Singh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party was leading the government in Uttar Pradesh, the Babri Masjid was attacked by BJP-supported kar sevaks, some of whom mounted the dome of the Masjid. The police had to resort to firing and some people were killed, including one volunteer from Kolkata. Thereafter riots took place in some parts of India and in Bangladesh, where some temples were attacked.

This was the background in which once again, when the BJP was in power in UP, with its government being headed by Kalyan Singh, the kar sevaks declared a march to Ayodhya to protest against the attack on them earlier. When asked by the Supreme Court on a petition made before it, why the kar sevaks were going there, the counsel for the UP government stated that their intention was to pray and sing religious songs.

Our Party demanded a meeting of the National Integration Council and the then Congress prime minister, P V Narasimha Rao did call a meeting on November 23, 1992 in Delhi which Harkishen Singh Surjeet, our Party's general secretary and I attended. I think no representative of the BJP spoke in the meeting. But all others called upon the prime minister to take adequate steps for the protection of the Masjid. Surjeet, on behalf of our Party, urged upon the PM to use Article 356 to remove the government if there was no other alternative for protecting the Masjid, despite the fact that we have been opposing Article 356, which for most of the time has been used wrongly by the central government. Prime Minister Narasimha Rao gave the assurance in the meeting that his government would maintain the rule of law by any means. He also reported in the meeting that the three-months of discussion between the centre and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, had fallen through. It was alleged by different parties, including V P Singh, that the BJP and its sangh parivar was subverting the Constitution, parliamentary democracy and the Court.

Two days before the demolition, I rang up the PM to tell him that alarming news was coming in about the preparations being made by the kar sevaks, to attack the Masjid. He told me that the Congress Working Committee would be meeting to discuss the situation. But no action was taken by the central government, and as planned, the Masjid was razed to the ground, with the police looking on. It was reported that a few top leaders of the BJP, including some who are now ministers of the BJP-led government, were present during this dastardly act, and cases are pending against them.

When Surjeet and I later met the PM we asked him why no attempt was made to save the Masjid; his only reply was that he could not distrust the chief minister of the state who assured him that nothing untoward would happen.

Communalism of the majority does lead, in some areas of our country, to minority communalism, helped by Pakistan and some other countries. The Congress(I), the biggest non-communal party in the Opposition at the centre, and now ruling in 14 states, is as yet not self-critical, and does not feel the necessity of any ideological campaign against the communal and fascistic forces.

EVIDENCE ON RECORD

I was asked by the Justice Liberhan Commission, set up a long time back to probe the demolition of the Masjid, to give evidence before it. I met the Commission for two days on January 29 and March 15, in the year 2001, and placed all these facts before it. I also presented the Commission with a cassette containing the speech of the ex-chief minister, Kalyan Singh in Kolkata after his government was dismissed. In the course of this speech, he gleefully, and with great pride, among other things, stated that the demolition was a great achievement, and a new era had begun in India.

I think it is worthwhile to add that because of my statements on communalism and calling such acts "uncivilised and barbaric", the prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, at a subsequent meeting in Kolkata said that he would ask me why I used such language. In the discussions with me which followed the meeting, I told him that I had not mentioned individuals, but I was of the view that vicious attacks against other religions, and demolition of their houses of prayer, are in my view, barbarous and uncivilised. They are also against our concept of unity in diversity, and do violence to our Constitution. I reminded him that he had at least expressed regret after the demolition, but his other colleagues had justified the demolition and there were criminal cases pending against them. I also told him that he listens to the RSS, the VHP and the Bajrang Dal, because he knows otherwise what fate awaits him.

Now on the Gujarat barbarism the PM on the one hand says he cannot show his face outside India, but, at the same time continues to support chief minister Narendra Modi.

PEOPLE’S DEMOCRACY, December 08,2002