The Ayodhya judgement has set a disastrous precedent for a secular democracy
The long-awaited verdict on the Babri Masjid came out on the 9th November, 2019. For those who have a background about the case and are interested only in the opinion, jump to Para 3. For others, I have given some high-level context below on the facts and timeline.
In 1949, shortly after the Independence of India, there were a few miscreants who planted Hindu idols in the Babri mosque in Ayodhya thereby making claims to the then disputed structure. It has been an agenda in BJP’s manifesto in each election ever since. In 1992, it was entirely demolished by the Hindu activists of Vishwa Hindu Parishad(VHP) — part of the broader Hindutva brigade. This triggered riots all across India, and around 2000 people lost their lives. In 2010 Allahabad high court gave its verdict in favour of the right-wing nationalistic Hindu party’s claim of it being the birthplace of Ram Lalla, but also made provision of one-third of the site to be allowed for the construction of the mosque. However, that judgement got overruled on 9th November when the Supreme court gave the entire site to a Trust to build a temple and provided an alternative 5-acre site for a mosque. Amongst other reasons, the main one that was cited was an Archeological Survey of India (ASI) report that mentioned a ‘pre-existing underlying structure dating back to the…
