Thinking on Ayodhya

Had events in India, over the last three decades, turned out to be different – it may have been plausible to write-off Dharampal’s support of the demolition of the Babri Masjid, in December 1992, as an insignificant error of judgement. But the worst fears of those who opposed the demolition have been confirmed and the situation continues to worsen at an ever-accelerating speed.

In January 1993 Mumbai was rocked by communal violence that went on for many weeks. This was a continuation of an earlier spurt of violence which had erupted immediately after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya on 6th December, 1992.
In mid-January that year, even while communal violence raged through parts of Mumbai, I was part of a group that spent four days at an ashram in Vrindavan attempting a dialog on the issues underlying the dispute in Ayodhya. On one side of this dialogue were activists from the Gandhian-Socialist tradition. On the other were full time workers, or supporters, of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).  The idea of this dialog had come up because some of the participants on both sides had been in jail together during the Emergency (1975-77) and friendships had endured through the decades. The whole effort was largely driven by Vijay Pratap, co-convenor of the Lokayan group (connected with the Centre for Study of Developing Societies) and an active member of various socialist forums, who had been engaging in dialog with friends in the RSS at a personal level for many years. Plans for this meeting, first initiated in mid-1992, had originally included friends from the Left parties or non-party Left groups. But most of them decided to opt out after the demolition – saying that there was now no point in attempting a dialog. The RSS, along with other fraternal organizations, had spear-headed the Ramjanmabhoomi campaign since the late 1980s which culminated in the demolition in Ayodhya. This is not the place for detailed reporting on that four-day meeting in Vrindavan.

Suffice to say that -- all present were deeply concerned with the future of India’s samaj but there was no agreement on what threatens the samaj and what would enrich it. I came away from those four days traumatized by the one message that was coming through loud and clear from the RSS workers and supporters. This was that – even if samaj breaks, we can rebuild it but the Sangh and its mission must not break (“samaj toot-ta hai to phir jod leinge, sangh nahin tootna chahiye”).

It is in this context that I was shocked when I heard that Dharampal had lauded the demolition in Ayodhya. Like many of my peers I admired Dharampal’s archival work and had earlier met him to discuss both history and contemporary issues. Therefore, at the first possible opportunity, I sought a meeting with Dharampal to learn first-hand about his position. The meeting took place sometime in March or April 1993 at Sevagram Ashram, near Wardha, where Dharampal was staying at that time.

With considerable hesitation, ‘sankoch’, and due respect I asked if it was true that he lauded the demolition in Ayodhya. When Dharampal confirmed that yes he welcomed the demolition, I asked why. It is the will of the people, he answered. This was long over-due, it is part of the necessary process of bringing down colonial symbols. Eventually, he added, Rashtrapati Bhavan, India Gate and other such colonial era structures should also be brought down.

He did not see the event in Ayodhya as specifically anti-Muslim. Then I pointed out that the campaign leading up to the demolition has been marked by slogans like “Musalmaan ke do hi sthaan – Pakistan ya kabristan” (there are only two places for Muslims -- Pakistan or graveyard.) When he appeared unmoved by this, I gave him some details of the horrific violence unleashed as a consequence of the Ayodhya campaign and more so post-demolition.  The conversation meandered about in this vein with Dharampal, at some point, saying that history is full of such incidents with large displacements of populations due to changes in the religion of the state.

By then I had lost all sense of hesitation or ‘sankoch’ and in a rather agitated manner I pointed to Mahatma Gandhi’s home, the Bapu Kuti, which was visible from where we sat and said that I thought we were all engaged in trying to make new kinds of history not repeating periods of darkness.
Dharampal answered me with silence. The conversation, that day, ended on this tense note.

In December 1993, we met again in a group setting at the first conference on India’s Traditional Science and Technologies hosted by the Patriotic and People-oriented Science and Technology (PPST) at IIT, Mumbai. Dharampal was a founding-mentor of the PPST. On the day after the PPST Congress ended, Uzramma, the founder of Dastakar Andhra, and I went to the IIT guest house to say goodbye to the scientist C. V. Seshadri, who was then President of PPST. We found him in the midst of a meeting with Dharampal. He invited us to stay and listen. To put it mildly, Seshadri was pleading with Dharampal to ‘see’ the destructive logic of not just his stand on Ayodhya but his support of the protagonists of that campaign. Dharampal was mostly silent but what little he said was essentially to the effect that: “Who am I to support or not, my views don’t matter”.

Seshadri contested this, saying of course what you say matters. Seshadri’s voice trembled with grief and anxiety as he said to Dharampal, in a pleading tone, why can’t you see that this path you are on will tear us apart, as a society and as a nation.
The meeting ended with Dharampal appearing stoic and mostly silent while Seshadri was visibly exhausted and heart-broken.

I invoke these memories here in the hope that they speak more directly, at a human level, than written reasoning behind political positions, which is already available in the public domain. Seshadri’s anxieties are crucial for understanding what is now at stake in the year 2021 and the near future. I aim to do this in an introspective spirit.