One year after the Ram temple in Ayodhya was consecrated by prime minister Narendra Modi in his embodiment of the chief priest of a Hindu State, there is no sense of ‘closure’ to the political narrative – running unceasingly since the mid-1980s – which tore India asunder besides propelling the Bharatiya Janata Party to its domineering position.
The absence of a ‘full stop’ to the mosque-temple dispute is in sharp contrast to the words of reassurance that Modi uttered last year after performing the religious rituals, that the inauguration of the (partially constructed) Ram temple was “not only an opportunity of victory but also of humility.”
Not only was the humbleness, that the prime minister so categorically pledged, absent in even several of his election speeches over the past year, but it is also conspicuously missing in innumerable assertions of many of his party colleagues, most notably chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Adityanath.
Quite clearly, the ‘resolution’ of the Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi imbroglio with the Ram temple’s portals being thrown open to devotees did not mark “a moment of realisation of the maturity of Indian society.”
Instead, the ‘movement’ continues sans humility and with the same ferocity that was its hallmark ever since the issue was patronised by the Sangh parivar from the mid-1980s.
In November 2019, those dismayed at the Supreme Court’s Ayodhya judgement took solace at the underlying message of the verdict: that the grant of the disputed site to the Hindu party to construct a temple safeguarded other places of worship from demands to alter their character.
This underlying message was based on the permanence of the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act 1991. The five judges who appended their signatures to probably the most awaited judgement of this era, also affirmed that the law, passed when the P.V. Narasimha Rao government was in office, “protects and secures the fundamental values of the Constitution.”
The verdict also categorically spelt out that the Act “speaks to the future by mandating that the character of a place of public worship shall not be altered” and that it “seeks to impose a positive obligation to maintain the religious character of every place of worship as it existed on 15 August 1947 when India achieved independence from colonial rule.”
One year after the consecration, Indians await the trial challenging the constitutionality of the same Act in which the apex court had raised the promise of a harmonious future when the character of no other place of worship shall be altered.
The Sambhal Mosque. Photo: Shruti Sharma/ The Wire.
One year after the Ram temple’s inauguration, Adityanath is walking the same path, but not in Ayodhya. Instead, he is doing so in Sambhal and has made it clear that the same norm would be followed in every place of worship which he would like to be “reclaimed” by the Hindus.
The UP chief minister, in fact, has asserted, “Reclaiming heritage is not a bad thing…Disputed structures should not be called mosques. India will not be run on the Muslim League mentality.”
Modi, who in his post-consecration speech, so vehemently declared: “Ram is not fire, Ram is energy. Ram is not a dispute, Ram is a solution”, now chooses silence at the Yogi’s declarations because he is worried over the latter’s strategy of upping the ante higher than anyone within the party.
One year after the consecration it is now painfully evident that the event was not a mere momentary symbol of triumph and revenge. Instead, the continuing onslaught, be it over the Gyanvapi Masjid in Varanasi, the Shahi Idgah in Mathura, the Jama Masjid in Sambhal or the shrines being claimed in Ajmer, Bhojshala and innumerable other Islamic places of worship, makes it evident that victory and vengeance shall be a continual process.
The process of constructing the Ram temple in Ayodhya was accompanied by the launch of massive developmental projects in the small-town turned religious megapolis, or a veritable Hindu Vatican.
This underscored that the Ram Janmabhoomi movement had morphed into one that was not intent on just a temple. Instead the andolan – movement – was now on way to raising a new central ‘sacred site’.
One year later, with the pursuit of innumerable Ayodhya-type agitations, it is now evident that there shall be new and ‘sacred’ sites in every nook and corner. And, since as per Adityanath, no disputed site can be referred as a mosque, there shall be none in this land if it is claimed by the Hindus.
The blueprint of the new Ayodhya mosque. Photo: By arrangement
The apex court in its aforementioned verdict of November 9, 2019, also directed the award of “a suitable plot of land measuring 5 acres” to the Sunni Central Waqf Board which would thereafter, be at liberty to “take all necessary steps for the construction of a mosque on the land so allotted together with other associated facilities”.
The land may have been allotted as directed, but the mosque remains a distant dream. In fact, it would another wonder of the world, this one located in the peripheries of Ayodhya, if it ever becomes a reality.
One year after the consecration, it is evident that instead of the grand temple marking the ‘resolution’ of the issue, this then would be the forbidding future lying in store for every ‘disputed’ Muslim place of worship.
Modi planned the inauguration of the partially-built temple last year to launch his electoral campaign. But now it is evident that the other ‘open’ disputes are aimed at launching a new phase of perpetual campaigns.
Those who have gained by polarisation on the basis of religious identity and by whipping up prejudice against the religious minorities, especially Muslims and Christians, probably do not think that peak levels have been reached yet.
Just as few heard of a ‘raging dispute’ right through the turbulent 1980s and 1990s over the medieval era mosque in Sambhal, there are many more similar disputes which will be raked up as and when the politics of Hindutva requires an impetus.
One year after Modi consecrated the Ram temple in Ayodhya it is evident that he merely raised a smokescreen by stating that “construction of this temple of Ram Lalla is also a symbol of peace, patience, mutual harmony and coordination of Indian society. We are seeing that this construction is not giving birth to any fire…”
Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay is a journalist and writer. His last book was The Demolition, The Verdict, And The Temple: The Definite Book on the Ram Mandir Project. He also wrote Narendra Modi: The Man, The Times.
