Updated: October 1, 2020 7:28:23 am
The Babri Masjid was demolished on December 6, 1992.
the CBI court verdict in a criminal case dispels the 28-year-old shadow that has haunted the main lights of the Ramjanma-bhoomi movement of Sangh Parivar that led to the demolition of Babri Masjid. That event, which divided society and politics and sparked violence across the country, also paved the way for what culminated with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. laying the first brick for the temple of Ram last month.
Despite the Supreme Court calling the demolition a “flagrant violation of the rule of law, ”Wednesday’s verdict lends an institutional shine to the temple movement. Even in government, the BJP always made a distinction between being named in a corruption case – ground for resignation – and being indicted in Babri’s “political” case. Now that political case has a legal imprimatur.
As for the demand for the title, the political consensus was that it should be left to the Supreme Court. Indeed, when the court ruled unanimously in favor of the temple, the entire BJP leadership, from the prime minister down, reacted cautiously by highlighting the “friendly settlement” that came through “due process of law.”
This verdict in a criminal case, accompanied by the Supreme Court’s title lawsuit ruling, gives the BJP-RSS a handle to ensure the legal legitimacy of its movement in the eyes of a generation that did not witness the demolition. .
Given how the RSS fought to disengage from the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, these verdicts, along with the ruling BJP, provide it with enough ammunition to reformulate the movement and try to eliminate the violence and divisions it generated.
Welcoming the court’s decision, RSS’s Suresh Bhaiyyaji Joshi said: “Following the decision, all sectors of society must come together in mutual trust and harmony to meet the nation’s challenges successfully and lead the nation by the path of progress “.
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In this photo from 2005, BJP leaders LK Advani, MM Joshi and Uma Bharti in Raebareli. (PTI photo)
Will the CBI file an appeal? It’s a natural course of action, said a senior BJP leader. But the record, from the Sohrabuddin encounter to the Hindutva terror, cases that the BJP considers politically motivated, puts a question mark on that.
Immediately after the verdict, BJP deputy Lallu Singh, one of the defendants, said The Indian Express: “We were incriminated by the authorities at the time and, moreover, three or four days after the incident for their political gain. The court has said it was not planned in advance. The leaders had no role in that. “
READ | Meticulously planned, Uma took responsibility: Judge Liberhan on the demolition of Babri Masjid
BJP Senior Leader and Party Secretary General Bhupender Yadav tweeted: “The truth has a way of presenting itself no matter how hard those who oppose the truth try. Babri’s verdict proves it once again… The assembly (of kar sevaks) was never declared illegal by any authority, in any way as prescribed by law. The conspiracy theorists were proven wrong. “
For the opposition, the challenge persists. This was a criminal conspiracy case and criticizing the defendant who was being released was a “low cost” option. Still, key defendants have been sidelined in the current power equation and the next generation of leaders has taken over the project to build the temple.
However, with the exception of the left and Congress, who ask for an appeal, most of the opposition is silenced, just as it was in the case of the title.
Read also | Ayodhya Conspiracy Case: How the Babri Masjid Demolition Trial Has Progressed Over the Years
“It is not soft Hindutva, but rather a case of let’s move on,” said a senior congressional leader. “The BJP trap is always open, for the Opposition to be branded pro-Muslim and we have to avoid entering it,” he said.
“We cannot get them to Owaisify,” said another senior opposition leader when asked why his party could not be as vocal as AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi on this issue. Calling the verdict “abhorrent”, Owaisi said it marked a “black day” for the judiciary and hurt those who “still believe in the Constitution, brotherhood, diversity and pluralism of India.”
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