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Template:AyodhyaDebate The Ayodhya debate is a political, historical and socio-religious debate that was prevalent especially in the 1990s in South Asia.

The Babri Mosque was a mosque constructed by order of the first Mughal emperor of India, Babur, in Ayodhya in the 16th century. Before the 1940s, the mosque was called Masjid-i Janmasthan ("mosque of the birthplace"). The mosque stood on the Ramkot ("Rama's fort") hill (also called Janamsthan ("birthplace"). According to Hindus fundamentalist, it was built on the birthplace of the deity Rama after the Mughal rulers demolished the Ram Mandir ("Temple of Rama") on its location as they had done to many other temples around India. It was destroyed by Hindu activists in a riot on December 6, 1992.

Before the demolition

It was until about 1990 the standard view that an ancient Ram Janmabhoomi temple was demolished and replaced with the Babri Mosque. References such as the 1986 edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica reported that "Rama’s birthplace is marked by a mosque, erected by the Moghul emperor Babar in 1528 on the site of an earlier temple". According to the Hindu view, the ancient temple could have been destroyed on the orders of Mughal emperor Babur. This view is challenged by many Muslims and 'Marxist'.

Politics

Many Indian observers see the controversy surrounding this mosque within the framework of Hindu fundamentalism and Hindu Revivalism. It was commonly believed by Hindus until about 1990 that the mosque stood on an ancient Hindu temple, though some commentators disagree and say that although the judiciary has been debating on the dispute of Babri Masjid (mosque) in Ayodhya for more than 40 years, it had remained a nonissue until the mid-1980s . The Encyclopædia Britannica of 1989 reported that the Babri Mosque stood "on a site traditionally identified" as an earlier temple dedicated to Rama's birthplace. According to their view, the ancient temple could have been destroyed on the orders of Mughal emperor Babur. This view is challenged by the Muslims, Indian secular, Marxist and some Indian historians since the early 1990s. However, demolition and constructing over older structures - temples and mosques was common in medieval India. There are a multitude of cases where temples were destroyed by Hindu conquerors of other Hindu kingdoms, and of Muslim mosques by Muslim conquerors.

The Hindu Nationalist movement has been pressing for reclaiming these Muslim buildings and calls this period a period of Hindu slavery and foreign rule. This is often unpalatable to the minority Muslim community and secularists who consider this period as culturally Indian noting that these rulers made India their own home and enriched India's varied traditions.

The legal case continues on the title deed of the land tract which is for the major part a Muslim trust (Wakf Board) or government controlled property; while the Muslim parties have agreed to hand over the land (not unlike the Masjid Shahidganj case in Lahore where the Gurudwara was handed over to the Sikhs) if it is proven a temple existed and demanding it be proven that it is indeed Ramjanmbhumi (i.e. Ram was born on this site) , the Hindu side wants a law in parliament to have it constructed saying faith in the existence of Ram Janmabhoomi can not be decided in a court of law.

Secularist view

A large number of prominent people, many of them sympathisers of the Communist/Congress party oppose the destruction of the Babri Mosque e.g. Anand Patwardhan, Gyanendra Pandey, Pujari Laldas etc. But it is claimed by some other Hindus associated with the BJP led movement that at the time the structure was felled, it did touch a chord with millions of Hindus who looked to this incident as a fountainhead of Hindu religious nationalism in India. Muslims on the other hand regarded this as a black day for the Indian nationhood and Indian secularism. While Muslims observe December 6 - the day this historic mosque and monument was felled - as a Black day, some Hindus observe this as the Shourya Divas - Victory Day.

The situation regarding the Ram Janmabhoomi has been compared to the Temple Mount controversies and claims in Israel by the Middle East scholar and Islam critic Daniel Pipes . In particular, Pipes writes:

"Ayodhya prompts several thoughts relating to the Temple Mount. It shows that the Temple Mount dispute is far from unique. Moslems have habitually asserted the supremacy of Islam through architecture, building on top of the monuments of other faiths (as in Jerusalem and Ayodhya) or appropriating them (e.g. the Ka'ba in Mecca and the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople)."

Nobel Laureate V. S. Naipaul praised Hindu Nationalists for "reclaiming India's Hindu heritage". He further added that the destruction of Babri mosque was an act of historical balancing and the repatriation of the Ramjanmabhoomi was a "welcome sign that Hindu pride was re-asserting itself"

In fiction

• The Babri riots are depicted in the 1995 film Bombay.
• Nasrin, Taslima: Lajja

References

1. Sayyid Shahabuddin Abdur Rahman, Babri Masjid, 3rd print, Azamgarh: Darul Musannifin Shibli Academy, 1987, pp. 29-30.
2. Legacy of Muslim Rule in India Chapter 8
3. 15th edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1986, entry "Ayodhya", Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica Inc.
4. e.g. Romila Thapar. Tom Bottomore: Dictionary of Marxist Thought, Blackwell, Oxford 1988, entry “Hinduism”.
5. "Rama’s birthplace is marked by a mosque, erected by the Moghul emperor Babar in 1528 on the site of an earlier temple", 1989 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, entry "Ayodhya".{Template:Fact}
6. e.g. Romila Thapar. Tom Bottomore: Dictionary of Marxist Thought, Blackwell, Oxford 1988, entry “Hinduism”.
7. Lessons for Ayodhya from Lahore gurdwara
8. Obeying court orders only course open: Muslim board
9. Naipaul, V.S, Beyond belief:Islamic Excursions Among the Converted Peoples,Vintage Books,1998
10. http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20000508&fname=V&sid=1&pn=4
11. Naipaul V.S. India, a million Mutinies now, Penguin 1992

Further reading

• Baburnama: Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emperor. 1996. Edited, translated and annotated by Wheeler M. Thacktson. New York and London: Oxford University Press.
• The Ayodhya Reference: Supreme Court Judgement and Commentaries. 1995. New Delhi:Voice of India.
• Ayodhya and the Future of India. 1993. Edited by Jitendra Bajaj. Madras: Centre for Policy Studies.
• Elst, Koenraad. 1991. Ayodhya and After: Issues Before Hindu Society. 1991. New Delhi: Voice of India.
• Elst, Koenraad, Ayodhya, The Finale - Science versus Secularism the Excavations Debate (2003) ISBN 81-85990-77-8
• Elst, Koenraad, Ayodhya: The Case Against the Temple (2002) ISBN 81-85990-75-1
• Emmanuel, Dominic. 'The Mumbai bomb blasts and the Ayodhya tangle', National Catholic Reporter (Kansas City, August 27 2003).
• Sita Ram Goel: Hindu Temples - What Happened to Them, Voice of India, Delhi 1991.
• Harsh Narain. 1993. The Ayodhya Temple Mosque Dispute: Focus on Muslim Sources. Delhi: Penman Publishers.
• R. Nath. Babari Masjid of Ayodhya, Jaipur 1991.
• A. Nandy, S. Trivedy, S. Mayaram, Achyut Yagnik Creating a Nationality: The Ramjanmabhumi Movement and Fear of the Self, Oxford University Press, USA (1998), ISBN 0195642716.
• Rajaram, N.S. (2000). Profiles in Deception: Ayodhya and the Dead Sea Scrolls. New Delhi: Voice of India
• Thakur Prasad Varma and Swarajya Prakash Gupta: Ayodhya ka Itihas evam Puratattva— Rigveda kal se ab tak (‘History and Archaeology of Ayodhya— From the Time of the Rigveda to the Present’). Bharatiya Itihasa evam Samskrit Parishad and DK Printworld. New Delhi.
• Thapar, Romila. 'A Historical Perspective on the Story of Rama' in Thapar (2000).
• Thapar, Romila. Cultural Pasts: Essays in Early Indian History (New Delhi: Oxford University, 2000) ISBN 0-19-564050-0.
• Ayodhya ka Itihas evam Puratattva— Rigveda kal se ab tak (‘History and Archaeology of Ayodhya— From the Time of the Rigveda to the Present’) by Thakur Prasad Varma and Swarajya Prakash Gupta. Bharatiya Itihasa evam Samskrit Parishad and DK Printworld. New Delhi. (An important work on the archaeology of the temple.)
• History versus Casuistry: Evidence of the Ramajanmabhoomi Mandir presented by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad to the Government of India in December-January 1990-91. New Delhi: Voice of India.

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