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Recognise Hindu power, Singhal warns Muslims

Sharat Pradhan in Kumbh Nagri (Allahabad)

Vishwa Hindu Parishad chief Ashok Singhal on Sunday called upon the Hindu masses to make the Ayodhya temple a "people's movement" and declared that 2001 would be dedicated to the Ram Janmabhoomi.

Addressing an open session of the sant sammelan (meeting of saints) at the VHP camp in Kumbh Nagari in the afternoon, he said, "The temple issue was closely associated with the lives of the Hindu masses and so was bound to take the shape of a people's movement."

In his usual provocative style, Singhal not only warned the government to hand over the acquired land at the disputed site in Ayodhya to Hindus, but called upon Muslims to "recognise the power of the large Hindu community".

He said, "We have waited patiently for eight years since the demolition of the disputed structure [the 16th century Babri Masjid], but not even one step forward was taken by anyone to pave the way for the construction of a grand temple in Ayodhya."

While the akharas (councils of Hindu religious sects) and shankaracharyas continued to boycott the sammelan on Sunday, the large tarpaulin enclosure in the VHP camp was packed to capacity with a couple of thousand saffron-robed men.

Meanwhile, in a surprise move, former Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament D B Rai flayed both the BJP and the VHP. "They are both using the Ram temple for their respective political gains; there is enough reason to believe that they are least interested in constructing he temple," Rai, who was Faizabad district police chief when the Babri Masjid was demolished, told reporters in Allahabad.

Rai termed the VHP's much-touted resolve on Saturday to renew its temple movement a farce. He said, "The VHP will only play politics in the name of the temple, not take any serious initiative to build it."

Rai, whom the BJP rewarded with a ticket for the parliamentary election from Sultanpur after he was suspended from the Indian Police Service, said, "If the BJP and VHP wanted to erect the Ram temple, they could have done so shortly after the demolition on December 6, 1992."

According to him, "A pre-fabricated marble model of the temple was kept in the palace of the raja of Ayodhya, who had offered it to the VHP for installation on the debris of the razed mosque, but both the VHP and the BJP chickened out."

He argued, "If the BJP had been keen on expediting a negotiated settlement, they could have easily taken some initiative at the government level since they have been in power for a few years now. Likewise, if they wanted a quick judicial solution to the tangle, the BJP government could have got a special bench constituted for day-to-day hearing of the matter."

A strong protagonist of the temple, Rai has decided to launch his own awareness campaign from May to "expose the VHP and its false claims".

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