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| Sunday, 1 June 2003 |
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Hindu hardliner says MPs to support controversial temple campaign AHMEDABAD, India, Saturday (AFP) A radical Hindu group said about 125 Indian MPs have promised to throw their weight behind a controversial campaign to build a temple near a razed mosque. Acharya Giriraj Kishore, vice president of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP, World Hindu Council), told reporters late Friday that the MPs had signed a resolution by the group to press parliament to enact a law paving the way for the temple construction. He said the government should not allow a mosque to be built alongside the proposed temple in the northern city of Ayodhya as it would spark communal tensions. On Wednesday, the chief of the ruling BJP party, Venkiah Naidu, told a rally that his party was willing to allow a mosque to be built alongside a temple at the site in Ayodhya. The VHP, considered an ideological ally of Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's BJP, was at the forefront of a campaign that led to Hindu zealots demolishing the mosque in Ayodhya in December 1992, which set off Hindu-Muslim riots across India that left 2,000 dead. The Hindus believe the mosque was built by Mughul emperor Babur after he demolished a temple that marked the birthplace of their god Ram. Since the demolition, the VHP and other Hindu outfits have been vigorously campaigning to "rebuild" the temple . The matter is now in the hands of the courts, which have ordered archaeologists to dig at the site to determine whether a temple existed beneath the mosque. |
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