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Ayodhya braces itself for more trouble

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

Ayodhya is slowly stirring, warily keeping an eye out for lurking trouble. For every time, the issue of the contentious temple/mosque in their city seems to be settled, someone rakes it up again.

The trouble began soon after The Week carried a story that gave the impression that construction activity was in full swing in Ayodhya. It highlighted the creation of statues and columns at Ayodhya and two other places in Rajasthan that had been going on for eight years as a part of the preparation for the proposed Ram temple.

The Opposition Congress, needing some stick to beat the Bharatiya Janata Party with, took up the matter. But the BJP actually played along with it for a while, since it helped it revive the Ayodhya issue. So it watched while its mother organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, went about promising to 'build the Ram temple at all costs' where the 16^th century Babri Masjid was pulled down by violent Hindu mobs on December 6, 1992.

After all, by allowing VHP leaders like Ashok Singhal and Acharya Giriraj Kishore to go about declaring, 'yes the temple construction work is on and no power on earth can stop it,' the BJP was playing to the gallery of its committed Hindu voters.

But then, as pressures from the coalition it led grew, the BJP found itself in a tight spot, and both Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Home Minister L K Advani got down to some serious fire-fighting. They gave assurances that no temple construction activity was going on at the disputed site and that the Supreme Court order of October 24, 1994 on maintaining the status quo would be strictly adhered to. But the issue had already blown out of proportion.

Had Advani given a detailed clarification in Parliament on day one, the issue might perhaps have become what it had. It was only after over a week of heated debate that Advani gave an assurance that no violation of the court order had been reported in Ayodhya.

He was lucky since his predecessor Indrajit Gupta of the earlier United Front government had made a similar statement after visiting Ayodhya to check similar rumours.

But Ayodhya has no reason to feel the issue has been settled. For Singhal and Giriraj Kishore have been roaming the town, issuing provocative statements promising the construction of the temple, even giving the impression that work was actually going on there.

Even that firebrand, Mahant Nritya Gopal Das, who headed the movement for the temple earlier, was unusually cautious when commenting on the current goings-on.

"We are not doing anything on the disputed site," he said, adding, "cutting and carving of stones for the pillars of the proposed temple is being done at our karyashala (workshop), which lies at least one kilometre (as the crow flies) from the disputed site." He emphasised, "In any case, this work has been on since the end of 1989 -- even before (the then chief minister) Mulayam Singh Yadav ordered firing on the kar sevaks."

He also asked why successive non-BJP governments had not stopped the activity. The mahant assailed Congress leader Rajesh Pilot for "going around showing a video film on the sculptors engaged in the workshop, when he himself had full knowledge of such activity even while he was in charge of the country's internal security."

Significantly, even leaders of a local minority body, the Ayodhya Muslim Welfare Society, saw no change in the situation since the demolition of the mosque in 1992.

"Who would know better than us; we are living here and can safely vouch that nothing new is happening at the disputed site," said society vice-president Babu Darzi." Asked how he could know when the entry of non-Hindus was virtually banned there, Darzi said, "We have very close social relations with several Hindu families who are regular visitors to the makeshift temple at the disputed site and we have no reason to doubt what they tell us."

Another officer bearer, Maulana Mohammad Ashraf, felt the politicians "were apparently out to bring trouble for us once again... Any construction activity would require building material. Surely, there are no underground tunnels to transport such material without drawing anybody's attention. Besides, there are 3,500 central paramilitary personnel there to maintain the status quo prescribed by the country's apex court."

Even otherwise feisty Bajrang Dal supremo and former Faizabad MP Vinay Katiyar maintained his peace this time, blaming the Congress and other Opposition parties for raking up the issue the BJP itself had put on the backburner.

"The process initiated by Vajpayee towards resolving the Ayodhya tangle through a negotiated settlement had made some headway," he claimed, arguing, "Evidently, that is something the Congress and the Opposition don't want. So they have played this dirty trick to vitiate the atmosphere once again."

Kaityar admitted, though, "We are committed to building the temple, but it isn't something that can be done overnight; preparations for the job will take years, even after a settlement is arrived at."

Citing the example of the reconstruction of the Somnath temple, attacked by Mahmud Ghazni in the middle ages, he pointed out, "The Somnath temple reconstruction was started by Sardar Patel in 1948, to be completed barely two years ago."

Katiyar claims the Ayodhya temple plan prepared by architect Chandrakant Sompura calls for 212 carved pink sandstone pillars. Of these not even 50 are finished now, he says. In fact, of the 170,000 cubic feet of sandstone estimated as being necessary for the temple, only about 40,000 cubic feet has been finished in the past eight or nine years." The plan has the two-storeyed temple being 350 feet long, 180 feet wide and 128 feet high.

While the politicians quibble and squabble, it is the commoner in Ayodhya who is the most uncertain.

"It was only after a prolonged spell of tension that life returned to normal here. The beginning of this decade had made our lives miserable," says shopkeeper Sant Lal. "If this current problems continue, we will be in for bad times again," he says.

Another local trader, Mahesh Kumar, expresses more disgust: "Can't the politicians leave us alone in peace? Why do they always want to use Ayodhya as their playing field?"

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