Ayodhya’s original security lapse

By Manoj Mitta

The success of the Central paramilitary forces in repelling a terrorist attack in Ayodhya in 2005 exposes the "security lapse" engineered at the same site by the BJP and Congress in 1992. If the security men could ensure that no harm was done to the makeshift Ram Janmabhoomi temple in the face of sophisticated firearms and explosives, it is safe to assume that they could have been as effective in protecting the solid Babri Masjid structure from vandals who happened to be equipped with nothing more than basic implements. If the nation has instead had to suffer a chain of mass killings triggered by the demolition of the mosque and, indeed, hasn’t still recovered from its communal hangover, it is because the Narasimha Rao government at the Centre and Kalyan Singh government in Uttar Pradesh had hampered the security forces in their own different ways.

The compromises made at that turning point in our history are worth recalling to put in perspective the recurring debates on national security and secularism.We must bear in mind that the forces that are now being feted in the context of the terrorist attack were not even allowed to be there when the so-called kar sevaks struck on December 6, 1992. Oddly enough, the forces could not enter the site and take charge of it until the night between December 7 and 8 — ie, more than 24 hours after the demolition of the mosque.

The Ayodhya issue might not have gone away but it would certainly have been in a different shape but for that delay in letting the paramilitary forces take over the disputed site. For, it was then that the kar sevaks built the makeshift temple that still stands and was recently the target of the terrorist attack.Had the Rao government reacted with alacrity to the demolition that began around noon on December 6, the Babri Masjid would have no doubt still suffered extensive damage. But the ruins of the structure would have probably still been standing on the disputed site and, more importantly, the idols would not have been there any longer.

This is because the kar sevaks had, at an early stage of the demolition, taken the idols away for their safety. If the Central forces had been given a free hand to stop the demolition, the Ayodhya movement would have taken a different turn, since the vandalised Babri Masjid would have been separated from the idols of Ram after 40 years.The Rao government did not however display any inclination to turn the tables on the kar sevaks. For the record, it sent as many as 195 companies of paramilitary forces to Faizabad, the twin town of Ayodhya, in the build-up to the December 6 crisis. All that the Centre instructed its forces to do was to respond immediately to the state Government’s request for assistance without waiting for the Centre’s clearance. Far from making such a request, the Kalyan Singh government publicly protested the Centre’s decision to station its forces near Ayodhya without the consent of the state.

Kalyan Singh’s adverse reaction to an obvious security measure should have alerted the Centre to the complicity of the state government with the organisers of what was supposed to be a “symbolic” kar seva. After all, an earlier kar seva held in 1990 did see an abortive attempt to damage the mosque as a few hotheads climbed the domes.Subsequent to the demolition of the three domes of Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992, the kar sevaks brought back the idols to the site around 6.30 pm and put them exactly where they had stood for four decades. Shortly, thereafter, they began the construction of the temporary structure for the idols.

Nothing was allowed to come in the way of that construction. Not even the fact that the Central forces had by then entered Ayodhya. Not even the fact that the state had been brought under President’s rule by 9 pm on December 6. The Central forces were allowed to take charge of the site only after the construction ended more than 24 hours later and the kar sevaks delivered a fait accompli in the form of the makeshift temple.Apparently, the Centre’s overweening concern was to avoid a repetition of the bloodshed that followed the Mulayam Singh government’s forceful response to the 1990 kar seva. In its White Paper, the Rao government sought to justify its inaction in this manner: "The officers commanding the security forces decided to move the force in the night of 7th and 8th December so as to use minimum force.

Action was taken accordingly, and the Ram Janmabhoomi- Babri Masjid area was quickly secured. This was managed without having to resort to firing." The subtext is: the two big parties colluded in sacrificing security and secularism at the altar of Hindutva. The nation is still paying for it.