Rites held at neutral site: Vajpayee envoy receives temple stones; curfew in Gujarat cities after fresh violence
By Jawed Naqvi
NEW DELHI, March 15: The Ides of March have come, said Julius Ceasar. “Aye, but not gone yet,” said the soothsayer. On Friday, much of India was trying to divine the mysterious message of the soothsayer as rightwing Hindu groups finished a ritual in Ayodhya peacefully only to issue a chilling warning that their campaign to build a temple at the site of a mosque that stood there would now intensify.
The ritual prayers or shila daan was carried out after Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee dispatched his personal emissary on Ayodhya to a site a kilometre away from the land forbidden for use by religious groups by the Supreme Court, to receive the “foundation stone” from the head priest of the temple committee.
The gesture brought a sharp retort from the opposition with Congress leader Sonia Gandhi accusing Vajpayee of collusion in a religious ceremony, thereby compromising the secular character of the state.
While most eyes were riveted on Ayodhya, violent groups were busy targeting rival communities in various parts of Gujarat.
According to reports reaching Delhi, several areas of Bharuch city were placed under curfew on Friday afternoon following incidents of violence. The Raopura and Panigate areas of Vadodara was also placed under curfew.
There were also reports of fresh trouble in Petlad area of Kheda district during the VHP’s Ram Dhun. The situation in Ahmedabad, where curfew was imposed in the Kalupur, Shahpur and Karanj areas, was quiet after a swift bout of violence, an Indian Express reporter said.
However, trouble was continuing in the Fatehpura, Machhipeeth and Yakutpura areas of Vadodara where mobs were pelting stones at each other. Police fired shots and tear-gas shells but there were no reports of casualties.
In Ahmedabad, one person was stabbed in the Pattharkua area of Karanj police station. He has been admitted to the hospital in a serious condition. Stray violence was also reported in other parts of Ahmedabad. A two-wheeler was burnt on Gandhi Road, triggering fresh bouts of violence. A bus belonging to the Ahmedabad Municipal Transport Service was set on fire at the Naranpura crossing in Ahmedabad on Friday afternoon.
Opposition leader Sonia Gandhi made a blistering attack on the government on the Ayodhya issue, charging it with openly collaborating with the religious revivalist Vishwa Hindu Parishad.
Participating in the debate on the motion of thanks to the President’s address in the Lok Sabha, she said while there was no substitute for firm and resolute action on the issue, the prime minister and his colleagues have “neither the will nor the capacity to deal with the VHP blackmail”.
Alleging that the BJP-led coalition took a “U-turn” in the matter, she said the explanation for such a somersault lay in the fact that several BJP MPs threatened the government with “dire consequences” in a letter to the prime minister on March 7.
Sonia Gandhi said this resulted in the Attorney General being asked to intervene in the matter in the Supreme Court. She said the “U-turn” was reflected in the government earlier asking state governments to prevent all volunteers from proceeding to Ayodhya but later telling them to provide police protection to those going towards the pilgrim centre.
Ms Gandhi said she has documents with her regarding the sudden shift in the government policy, including the letter of BJP MPs. In her 30-minute speech, the Congress president accused the BJP-led coalition of “caving in” to communal forces and overlooking national interests.
“The Central Government’s acts of omission and commission on Ayodhya are shameful to say the least,” she declared.
She said people of the country felt that the prime minister and his government were “neutral” to VHP’s plan till the prime minister instructed his Attorney General to plead for this plan in court. Sonia Gandhi said what happened in the apex court on March 13 shocked the nation about the “duplicity of the government agenda”.
Terming Ayodhya as an “irrelevant issue”, the Telugu Desam, a key NDA ally, warned Vajpayee’s government that it would face drastic consequences if it chose “wrong priorities”.
In an interesting remark, a top functionary of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), the parent body of the VHP and BJP, said on Friday that the BJP had no links with the RSS as it moved away from the RSS agenda in 1999 when it dropped the Ram temple issue from its plank.
“We have no links with the BJP. It’s only that some swayamsevaks are in the government,” RSS spokesperson M. G. Vaidya told reporters at Channehahalli in Bangalore where the RSS General Council is holding its three-day session.
About the attack by some of BJP allies on Attorney General Soli Sorabjee’s remarks in Supreme Court on March 13 on the shila pujan issue, Vaidya said: “They (the allies) are more concerned about electoral politics than justice.”
In Ayodhya, Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas President Mahant Ramchandra Das Paramhans performed the controversial shila daan at the Digmaber Akhara in Ayodhya. VHP Working President Ashok Singhal and BJP MP Vinay Katiyar were also part of the religious ceremony.
The sacred stones for the proposed Ram Temple were handed over to Shatrughan Singh, in-charge of the Ayodhya Cell in the Cabinet Secretariat, after a brief puja at 3.30pm (IST), one hour 15 minutes behind schedule.
In a last-minute change in programme, the spot for the symbolic offering was shifted to Paramhans’ Akhara as senior police officials felt the situation in the city was volatile and could go out of control. The Akhara is 600 metres away from Ramkot mohalla, the original site for the shila daan and a kilometre away from the acquired land.
Earlier in the day, the Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas president had said that he would abide by the Supreme Court order and would donate the shila outside the acquired land. The change in the stand came after the Nyas President held hectic parleys with top central leaders, including Home Minister L. K. Advani and Defence Minister George Fernandes, besides state government emissaries and senior VHP leaders.
“I will not enter the acquired land till its possession is given to Hindus,” the Mahant said.
Elsewhere, describing the violence after the Godhra incident as a “natural reaction of Hindus”, the RSS on Friday gave a clean chit to the Narendra Modi administration in Gujarat, saying no government could have controlled the “upsurge.”
While expressing the view that the “natural reaction (the violence)” was unjustifiable, RSS spokesperson MG Vaidya said: “Whole Hindu society irrespective of caste, creed and political affiliations, reacted violently against what had happened at Godhra.”
NEW DELHI, March 15: The Ides of March have come, said Julius Ceasar. “Aye, but not gone yet,” said the soothsayer. On Friday, much of India was trying to divine the mysterious message of the soothsayer as rightwing Hindu groups finished a ritual in Ayodhya peacefully only to issue a chilling warning that their campaign to build a temple at the site of a mosque that stood there would now intensify.
