Advani and the truth (Regarding Babri Masjid demolition)

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Advani and the truth (Regarding Babri Masjid demolition)
Moe
06/09/01 at 13:12:35
[slm]

Advani and the truth

By S Ubaidur Rahman

Courtesy: Milli Gazette

One of the most important accused in the Babri Masjid demolition case LK
Advani appeared before the Liberhan Commission of Inquiry on 10 April.
LK Advani who is among 41 people charge-sheeted by the Central Bureau of
Investigation (CBI) on 5 October 1993 in the Babri demolition case,
deposed before the commission set up years ago. What he said before the
commission can best be described as a bundle of lies unbelievable to
even people who have not been able to keep track of the demolition
development.

If a single person who could be credited with spoiling India's secular
fabric and bringing the two major communities of the country at
loggerhead it is LK Advani who led the Babri demolition from front. Not
only he headed the Rath Yatra in 1990 that led the country to the
greatest communal divide and caused lot of bloodshed in the whole
country, but also participated and led the hooligans (Karsevaks) in
Ayodhya in December 1992 to demolish the historical Babri Masjid.
Now this very same person talks of deepest sorrow on the demolition of
the Babri Masjid and goes on to say that it was the saddest day of his
life.

The man who occupies most important seat in the central government
behind only the Prime Minister has been fooling around not only the
common populace but also the government and our courts. Testifying for
the first time before the MS Liberhan Commission on 10 April, Advani
said that the demolition of the Babri Masjid on 6 December was
'unfortunate and painful' and that 'seldom felt as dejected and downcast
as I felt that day.' Advani also said that the demolition was
unfortunate 'even from the point of view of the cause which my party,
BJP, was promoting when it supported the Ayodhaya movement.' The very
next day, LK Advani made a new revelation. The home minister on 11 April
said that a de jure temple already existed at the disputed site as a
consequence of the 6 December 1992 demolition and the court's direction
to maintain the status quo. He also said on his next appearance before
the Liberhan Commission that a de facto temple had existed on the site
covered by the 'disputed structure' before the
demolition. He added that the courts’ order to maintain the status
quo after the construction of the makeshift temple has made the de facto
temple de jure. He went on to say, 'nothing but a temple exists at the
place. And the court's direction to maintain the status quo have
accorded de jure recognition to a de facto temple'. LK Advani speaks in
different tones at different times. The man who lobbied all these years
for destruction of the Babri Masjid and went on to organize Rath Yatras
and then presided over the demolition in Ayodhya is now showing regret
for the demolition. The same man writing in September 16-30, 1997
edition of his party's organ BJP Today, the prime mover of the
anti-Babri Masjid campaign expressed regret not for the mosque
demolition-which he actually justified-but for the manner in which this
happened.

He in the same article had written that 'The mosque at Ayodhya without
doubt was a continuous ocular demonstration against Hindus. Now that the
ocular provocation is no longer there, it is not a matter of regret.'
Speaking at a public meeting in Ranchi on 24 February
1990, Advani said that 'no one could stop the construction of the temple
at Ayodhya at the site chosen by the VHP.' If Ram Janambhoomi temple is
not allowed to be constructed at Ayodhya, where will it be
constructed-in London? Advani added. Justifying the Babri demolition,
Advani, while addressing a gathering to release a book on 22 October
1993 said that 'the Ayodhya movement signifies the awakening of India's
national ethos', adding that 'he had predicted that government's failure
to solve the dispute would turn it into the biggest mass  movement in
the history of India.'

Merely a week before the demolition of the historical mosque, taking a
dig at the government and the judiciary alike, a statement drafted by
Advani on 29 November 1992 said, 'All the time required by the
government and the judiciary has been and is being given, only because
of the responsibility that weighs heavily on the Hindus, the movement
and its leadership. But this shall not deter or detract us from the
objective of the movement.' The statement added that, 'the BJP is
committed to construct the temple. Court wrangling can delay and New
Delhi can obstruct but no one can deny ultimately.'

The party whose government in UP after giving assurance to the apex
court that no harm will be made to the mosque, destroyed it by hooligans
it had gathered in Ayodhya has no regard for judiciary. Saffron
organizations have always made it amply clear that they have no regards
for court and do not believe in the judicial system of the country.

LK Advani in a press conference organized on 30 November 1992 amply
showed that he does not believe in the courts when he said, ' The
recent judicial proceedings on Ayodhya have sent an unambiguous message
to Ram Janambhoomi movement that the courts are inadequate forum for the
purpose.' He further said that 'I am convinced that it is only the
people who can assert in this manner-and provide the lead.' Advani on
the same occasion said that 'the worse aspect of it all has been the
pressuring and signaling to courts to delay decision and put up hurdles
for kar seva.' Advani made it amply clear that the courts are not
capable to solve the issue when he took a dig at the government for
drawing the judiciary at the highest level 'into what is essentially
a political issue and besides a matter of religious faith'. He blamed
the courts for wittingly delaying the issue when he said in the very
same press conference that 'there were two clear trends in the judicial
orders on Ayodhya - an attempt to delay the decision that would clear
the legal hurdles to construct the temple and a discernible anxiety to
expedite injunctions that would stifle kar seva.' 'If the judiciary
today is seen as an instrument to grant what the government wants the
responsibility for that is largely on the government' Advani added.
Advani should have been tried for contempt of court when he rejected
a proposal by former prime minister Chandra Shekhar who proposed that
'there be no temple construction until the court passes its judgement.'

Advani said on July 1992, six months after demolition, that 'Mr.
Speaker, sir, Shri Chandra Shekhar might be knowing that I did not agree
to this proposal when it was raised in the National Integration Council
meeting because the case is there in the courts for 45 years and I do
believe there will be no judgement in the case even in 45 years to come
as so many issues are involved in it.' The home minister who said while
deposing before the commission that he did not play any role in the
white paper on the Babri demolition brought out by the BJP after the
demolition, but the facts indicate that it was he who played most
important role in drafting the white paper that is nothing but
a distortion of the facts on the Babri issue. It was Advani who released
the paper on 18 April 1993 and also briefed the media on the occasion.

The greatest lie that Advani spoke on the occasion was to say that not a
single person was killed for the demolition. Nothing could be farther
from the truth than this statement. Not only the demolition set off
innumerable riots in the whole country but his earlier Rath Yatras had
also resulted in hundreds of deaths in the width and breadth
of the country. Thousands of unarmed Muslims were butchered by rampaging
saffron activists, their properties worth billions of rupees
were set in flames, their women dishonored in remotest as well as in as
central parts of the country as Delhi Mewat and Meerut.

If Advani does not know of the people killed during these riots he
himself instigated and sparked off in the whole country first by
organizing his infamous Rath Yatra and then getting the mosque
demolished for which he himself collected tens of thousands of frenzied
people in Ayodhaya, let us inform him of what happened only the very
next day of the demolition across the country. 'At least 225 people were
killed and about 1000 wounded across the country today in unabated
widespread violence and police firing sparked by the destruction of
Babri Masjid at Ayodhya (TOI, 8 December 1992). In Mumbai alone more
than forty people were killed and hundreds others wounded in riots that
broke out just after the demolition news spread. In other parts of
Maharashtra an equally large number of people were killed. 41people were
killed in Gujarat out of which 27 people lynched in Ahmadabad alone.
Around three dozen lives were lost in Uttar Pradesh in the communal
riots that broke out with the spread of news of Babri demolition. In
Babupurwa area of Kanpur six people were burnt alive. In
Jaipur, Rajashtan alone death toll went up to 22. In Bhopal more than
twenty people were killed on the same day, while ten people were killed
in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, four were killed in Ujjain, three in
Burhanpur and one in Jabalpur. In Hyderabad around ten people were
killed on the same day. In down south too there were a number of deaths
in the riots that broke out following the demolition. In Bangalore
alone 22 lives were lost while 9 people were killed in Bidar whereas
five people were killed in Gulbarga. These are not the full statistics
even of the day one of the violence following the demolition, a number
of people were killed in cities like Calcutta, Surat, Patna, Rampur,
Saharanpur, Ghaziabad and other parts of the country. The heinous crimes
committed against Muslims in Surat remained more or less unreported.
Though several times more people were killed in Bombay in post
demolition riots but what happened in Surat was no less gruesome. In
some respect Surat riots were a degree worse than those of Bombay. Here
many women were raped under searchlights and then burnt.

Official figures released by the interior ministry, Government of India
show that in the year 1992 alone 1601 people were killed in riots that
broke out all over the country. 10417 people were injured according to
the official figures. The report shows that the very next year 952
people were killed in communal flare-ups caused by the demolition of
the Babri Masjid. During the same year 2989 people were injured during
those clashes. In post demolition riots in Bombay alone around one
thousand people were killed. The immediate beneficiary of all these
bouts of riots as well as riots that occurred before the Demolition
benefited none but the party represented by Advani. A party that had
just a handful seats in early nineties in the Lok Sabha is now governing
the country thanks to the riots and communal divide that took place
during its unholy campaign for the demolition of the Babri Masjid.

Ye tune Hind ki hurmat ke aaine ko toda hai
khabar bhi hai tujhe masjid ka gumbad todne wale
ye masjid aaj bhi zinda hai ahle dil ke sine men
khabar bhi hai tujhe masjid ka paikar todne wale
abhi yeh sarzamin khali nahin hai nek bandon se
abhi maujud hain tute hue dil jodne wale
(Jagannath Azad on hearing the incident of the Babri demolition).


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