A journey

          

             I was a teenager when the Babri Masjid was demolished. The Ram Janmbhoomi moment had been gathering momentum in the days leading to this fateful event, especially after Mr Advani’s Rath Yatra. Like most other ‘ordinary’ Indians, and being a teen,I believed that all this was political gimmick and nothing would come out of it. The BJP and L.K Advani were the ‘rising star’ of Indian politics back then and it was obvious that they wanted to keep the pot boiling as a means to power-so I thought.  So when the news broke out on 6^th December 1992, it was met with shock and excitement. I remember us chanting Jai Shri Ram during one of our periods, only to be shut down by our teachers.  There were no 24X7 news channels back then. But of whatever we could see on television, the images of Kar Sevaks on top of the tomb still linger in my mind.  Personally, I was bewildered. On one side I felt a sense of gratification being a Hindu, followed by a subtle sense of guilt. I remember peeking at my Muslim friend while we were chanting Jai Shri Ram in the class and wondering what he must be thinking. I was also worried that this could bring irreversible changes to secular fabric of the country and the consequent dangers it would bestow (well that’s what the media would tell us back then!)  – Some of which did materialize by means of the riots that followed and subsequent Mumbai Bombings of March 1993. In general the next few years were marked by political turmoil, isolated violence and acts of terrorism on the pretext of avenging the demolition.

Subsequently the case went subjudice and lost steam. At times I felt it was a masterstroke by Narsimha Rao to end the ‘menace’ once and for all. Of course these were just my personal thoughtsJ. As years passed Ram Lalla only remained on the Manifesto of the Bhartiya Janata Party and the occasional calls for the temple during the Dussera Rally of the Sangh. I remember during the late 90s and early 2000s when one or the other new channel would remind us of the “nth anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid”. Soon the anniversaries and the reminders vanished and Babri Masjid faded from public memory. The dust had settled and fortunately the so called ‘secular-fabric’ of the country was still intact, except on political battlegrounds. Until ten years back one could bet heavily on the fact that a Ram Mandir could never see the light of the day at the disputed site in Ayodhya given the pace at which the case proceeded in court and also a lack of political and religious consensus amongst the warring parties. Ironically another set of events unveiled a year before the demolition- the economic reforms, brought far more sweeping changes on the social, economic and political front in the years to come and Babri became a ‘thing of past’.

My individual viewpoints have also transformed alongside the struggle of the Ram temple. From an individualistic Hindu perspective of “Why is a temple needed when I can pray Ram at my home” and “Who cares if a certain Babar built something, after all he couldn’t destroy Hinduism in India” which I had developed during teens, I began to recognize the political need to maneuver the larger Hindu desire and the fact that social form of Hinduism does need a manifestation especially in the background of centuries of non-Hindu rule in the country. And what embodies that better than a temple for Ram Lalla at the place of his birth? All along, I also firmly felt that the welfare of modern Indian state was paramount even to the desire of its vast majority. In essence, it was an Individual journey from “my Ram” to “Our Ram”. Good sense prevailed and due to the maturity of all concerned parties AND the judiciousness of honorable Supreme court, we are to witness the foundation of a grand temple at Ayodhya. Today, 5^th August 2020 epitomizes fulfillment of five centuries of Hindu desire and decades of struggle. It is a moment of pride and happiness for those who batted for the temple for three decades and a joyous occasion for the Hindus across the globe.  Let this auspicious occasion also lead to a sense of brotherhood and harmony among all Indians and the world at large.

||Jai Shri Ram ||