LK Advani’s Blog

I spent the first twenty years of my life in Karachi. The only two languages I became conversant with during that period were my mother tongue Sindhi, and the language I had my education in, English.

 

Because of my fondness for films, I could somewhat understand Hindi and also speak some broken Hindi, but I could neither read Hindi nor write it.

 

In September 1947, a month after partition, I came over to this part of the country. The next one decade 1947 – 1957 I worked as an RSS pracharak in different parts of Rajasthan.

 

Being a total ignoramus in so far as the Devanagri script was concerned, weighed heavily on my mind. I spent a lot of time first familiarizing myself with the Devanagri alphabet and then reading as many Hindi books as I could.

 

It is during this phase that I read almost all the historical novels about Gujarat written by Dr. Kanaiyalal Maniklal Munshi. Having read earlier much of the fiction authored by French writer Alexandre Dumas, Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Crists, Black Tulip etc. I could  see the influence of Dumas in Munshi’s style. It is in the course of my study of Dr. Munshi’s works  (written originally in Gujarati)  that I came across Jaya Somnath, a book that was to influence even my politics later.

 

Jaya Somnath, of course, was a fictional story set against the backdrop of the invasion of the Somnath Temple and its ransacking and destruction. But reading that made me interested in the story of Somnath as it developed in modern day Independent India. In an article published in Selections from The COMPLETE WORKS OF SWAMI VIVEKANANDA under title “The Future of India”, Swamiji writes:

 

“Temple after temple was broken down by the foreign conqueror, but no sooner had the wave passed than the spire of the temple rose up again. Some of these old temples of South India, and those like Somnath in Gujarat, will teach you volumes of wisdom, which will give you a keener insight into the history of the race than any amount of books. Mark how these temples bear the marks of a hundred attacks and a hundred regenerations, continually destroyed and continually springing up out of the ruins, rejuvenated and strong as ever ! That is the national mind, that is the national life-current.  Follow it and it leads to glory.”

 

It is therefore only natural that, when India became independent, many Hindus felt that 1947 should signify not only freedom from British rule but also a clean break from those aspects of the pre-British history that were identified with subjugation, assaults on Hindu temples, vandalizing idols and erosion of our noble cultural traditions. 

 

One such occasion presented itself in the princely state of Junagadh in Gujarat’s Saurashtra region where the Somnath temple is located. Over eighty per cent of Junagadh’s population was Hindu, but its Nawab was a Muslim. On the eve of Independence, the nawab announced the accession of his state to Pakistan. This enraged Junagadh’s Hindus whose revolt against the Nawab culminated in their setting up a parallel government under the leadership of  Samaldas Gandhi, a local Congress leader. The Nawab, an uncaring and decadent ruler, who was highly unpopular with his people, sought the support of Pakistan.  All his tricks were of no avail, so one night he finally fled to Pakistan. 

 

Samaldas Gandhi and the Dewan of Junagadh, Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto, who, incidentally, was Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s father, conveyed to India that Junagadh was acceding to India.  Munshi recalls in his book Pilgrimage to Freedom that Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, India’s first Home Minister and the chief architect of the integration of the princely states into the Indian Union, handed over the telegram of accession to him with the words: ‘Jai Somnath’.

 

Four days after the take-over of Junagadh on 9 November 1947 by the Government of India, Patel visited Saurashtra. He was accompanied by  N.V. Gadgil, the Minister of Public Works and Rehabilitation of Refugees in Nehru’s Cabinet. They received a rousing welcome from the people of  Junagadh.  At a public meeting in his honour, Patel made an important announcement: the government of independent India would reconstruct the historic temple of Somnath at the same spot where it stood in ancient times, and re-install the jyotirlingam.

 

Shortly after Sardar Patel’s return from Junagarh, Prime Minster Nehru convened a Cabinet meeting and formally endorsed Patel’s announcement. That evening when Patel and Munshi called on Gandhiji, he also blessed the move, but told them that the cost of construction should be borne by the people, and not by Government. A decision therefore was taken that a Somnath Trust would be set up.

 

The Government of India appointed Dr. K.M. Munshi as Chairman of the Advisory Committee for the construction of the Somnath Temple. Dr. Munshi had contemplated that he would have Sardar Patel inaugurate the temple. But by the time the construction was completed,  Sardar Patel had passed away.

 

In his book Pilgrimage to freedom, Dr. Munshi writes:

 

“When the time came to install the deity in the Temple, I approached Dr. Rajendra Prasad and asked him to perform the ceremony, but added a rider to my invitation that he should accept it only if he was prepared not to fail us.

 

“Dr.Rajendra Prasad that he would come and install the deity whatever the attitude of Prime Minister and added: “I would do the same with a mosque or church if I were invited “This, he held, was the core of Indian secularism. Our State is neither religious nor anti – religious.

 

“My foreboding proved correct. When it was announced that Rajendra Prasad was attending the inauguration of the Somnath Temple, Jawahar Lal vehemently protested against his going to Somnath. But Rajendra Prasad kept his promise. ”

****

 

The BJP’s National Executive met at Palampur (Himachal Pradesh) in June 1989 and formally adopted a resolution supporting the Ayodhya movement.  The resolution urged the Government to adopt the same approach towards the Ayodhya Temple that the first Government of independent India displayed towards Somnath Temple.

 

My decision to embark on a 10000 km long Rath Yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya commencing Sept. 25, 1990 was intended to mobilize support for the cause of the Ayodhya Temple.  The Yatra precipitated in the country a debate: Genuine Secularism versus Pseudo Secularism – a debate that had first come to the fore forty years earlier when Pandit Nehru had reprimanded Dr. Munshi for his activity related to Somnath.

 

Dr. Munshi writes in one of the issues of his Bhavan’s journal reproduced in Pilgrimage to Freedom:

 

At the end of a Cabinet meeting, Jawaharlal called me and said : “I don’t like your trying to restore Somnath.  It is Hindu revivalism.”

 

Dr. Munshi did not react immediately.  But his considered reaction was a several pages long letter to the Prime Minister emphasizing that his activities in relation to Somnath were not any personal enterprise, but were in pursuance of the Government’s own decision.

 

Stressing the social reform aspect of Somnath’s reconstruction, Munshi wrote:

 

“The intention to throw open the temple to Harijans has evoked some criticism from the orthodox section of the Hindu community.  However, the objects of the Trust Deed make it clear that the temple is not only to be open to all classes of the Hindu community, but according to the tradition of the old temple of Somnath, also to non-Hindu visitors.  Many have been the customs which I have defied in personal life from boyhood.  I have laboured in my humble way through literary and social work to share or reintegrate some aspects of Hinduism, in the conviction that that alone will make India an advanced and vigorous nation under modern conditions.

 

The letter concludes with these stirring and challenging words:

 

“It is my faith in our past which has given me the strength to work in the present and to look forward to our future. I cannot value India’s freedom if it deprives us of the Bhagavad Gita or uproots our millions from the faith with which they look upon our temples and thereby destroys the texture of our lives. I have been given the privilege of seeing my incessant dream of Somnath reconstruction come true. That makes me feel-makes me almost sure-that this shrine once restored to a place of importance in our life will give to our people a purer consciousness of our strength, so vital in these days of freedom and its trials.”

 

On reading this letter, V.P. Menon, the legendary civil servant who assisted Sardar Patel in the gigantic task of the integration of the princely states, wrote a missive to Munshi. ‘I have seen your masterpiece. I for one would be prepared to live and, if necessary, die by the views you have expressed in your letter.’

 

****

In my autobiography, completed in early 2008, I have recorded that a solution to the Ayodhya dispute was imminent during Vajpayee’s rule. On pages 419-421, I have written:

 

“As one of the principal participants in the Ayodhya movement, it had been my endeavour throughout the six years of the NDA rule to see how the dispute could be resolved speedily and peacefully. 

 

“The three options for dispute-resolution were obvious:

 1) Legislation; 2) Judicial verdict; and 3) Amicable settlement between representatives of Hindu and Muslim communities. 

 

“After a thorough review of both the political and judicial aspects of the Ayodhya issue, I came to the conclusion that the best path to follow was the last option- and I articulated it on several occasions, both inside and outside Parliament.

 

“In a nutshell, my view was: The potential for a legislative solution cannot be ruled out, but its chances are slim. The judiciary may give its verdict, but it is likely to upset one side or the other.  The third option offers the prospect of a solution of mutual acceptability and durability.  Of course, even a mutually acceptable settlement has to be sanctified by the judiciary, which has to extinguish all the pending cases before it.  

 

In this sense, the ultimate solution will be a combination of options 2 and 3.

 

“I am happy that Atalji and I succeeded in convincing our allies in the NDA to endorse this constructive approach. Accordingly, the alliance’s election manifesto for the 2004 parliamentary elections stated: ‘The NDA believes that an early and amicable resolution of the Ayodhya issue will strengthen national integration.  We continue to hold that the judiciary’s verdict in this matter should be accepted by all. At the same time, efforts should be intensified for dialogue and a negotiated settlement in an atmosphere of mutual trust and goodwill.

 

“I am gratified to record here that, as Home Minister, I had made considerable progress in bringing influential representatives of the Hindu and Muslim communities on a common negotiating platform.  This endeavour was facilitated by some sincere and well-meaning mediators on both sides.  Several rounds of talks, beyond the glare of publicity, took place. A mutually acceptable solution was clearly in sight, which would have paved the way for construction of the temple. 

 

“The principles and contours of a workable agreement had emerged in the beginning of 2004, and it was decided by the two sides that an announcement to this effect could be made immediately after the elections to the 14^th Lok Sabha in May.  Of course, this was done on the expectation, on both the Hindu and Muslim sides, that the Vajpayee government would win a renewed mandate in the election and take the responsibility of implementing the mutually agreed formula.  Sadly, that was not to happen.

 

“I am, however, a firm believer in destiny. I am convinced that the rise of a befitting temple at Ramjanmabhoomi in Ayodhya is pre-destined. How and when it will happen is a matter of secondary importance to be determined by the forces of history. But the fact that it will happen is as certain as the certainty that brought the oft-demolished and oft reconstructed Somnath temple into existence yet again.

 

“I am humbled by the awareness that destiny granted me an opportunity to play a role in this collective national effort that is waiting for the fulfillment of a centuries-old Hindu resolve. My only wish and appeal is that our Muslim brethren come forward with a gesture of magnanimity and goodwill that matches that of the Hindus.”

 

I feel extremely happy to say today that after the landmark judgement delivered by the Allahabad High Court two days back, the country has arrived at a fortuitous point, where Option 2 and 3 identified above can well be blended. 

 

As both the RSS as well as the BJP have emphasized, this judgement has given judicial recognition to the fact that millions in the country do believe that the make shift temple where Ram Lala is presently installed is Ram Janma Bhoomi - the birthplace of Rama. 

 

The situation no longer is Faith versus Law, it is Faith upheld by Law.

 

 

L.K. Advani

New Delhi

3 October, 2010

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