NEW DELHI: Tension prevails across India, especially in Uttar Pradesh, where the Ram temple is going to be inaugurated at the site of the demolished five centuries old Babri Mosque at Ayodhya on Monday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is using the event as a political gimmick.
According to Kashmir Media Service, as building the temple has been part of BJP’s election strategy for decades, Muslim Indians have sent their children and women to relatives in neighboring towns after fearing attacks by the Hindutva mob.
On 6 December 1992, a Hindu mob had razed the sixteenth-century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya on the bogus claim that the Muslims had built it over the place of an ancient temple. The destruction of the holy mosque is celebrated as a day of victory by Hindutva supporters, while for Muslims, it was a day of terror. Since the BJP government came into power in 2014, wiping out all traces of Muslim or Islamic civilization from the country has become the primary objective of the Narendra Modi regime.
The central force has been safeguarding the Ramjanmbhoomi since the late 1990s. Special state forces have the largest component, with 1,400 personnel from UP Police and PAC that would be stationed in the ‘red zone’ just outside the temple. Artificial intelligence (AI), drones, and CCTVs are being used as an added layer of security.
A local Muslim organization submitted a petition to local authorities calling for strict security and vigil in localities with sizeable Muslim populations as well as other parts of the city, which witnessed the demolition of Babri Mosque and communal violence in 1992.
Figures Invited to Ram Temple Inauguration Event
Among those invited to the inauguration include film stars Ranbir Kapoor, Rajnikanth, Kangana Ranaut, Amitabh Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit, Akshay Kumar, Anushka Sharma, and Virat Kohli.
Interestingly, some of the most senior religious leaders of Hindu sects are boycotting the event.
In an interview, the president of the Deoband Muslim seminary, Arshad Madani, expressed similar fears. Muslims residing in Ayodhya town say they are worried.
In Ayodhya town, Muslims and Hindus have lived in peace, but in the past, due to mobs of outsiders at multiple events, the Muslim community has suffered the loss of life, property, and religious places, stated Muslims’ petition to the police.
In Ayodhya district, 14.8% of about 2.5 million inhabitants are Muslims. There are roughly five thousand Muslims in a four-kilometer radius around the temple.
