Two eminent people from the legal fraternity and a spiritual guru have been entrusted with mediating in the sensitive Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid land case. While the outlook isn’t all that sanguine given that at least one party to the Ayodhya dispute has already declared its opposition, it’s on the cards that the Supreme Court Constitution Bench’s move to give mediation a chance will help assuage some of the passions that lit up the case over the last three decades. Had the dispute been simply one involving the legality of title deeds, an amicable solution could have been possible earlier even through the maze of documents in seven languages. What complicated the issue is the matter of faith, that guides the basic urge among sections of Hindus to build a Ram temple on land on which a masjid stood from 1582.
It would be in the national interest for all parties to go into the mediation process, due to start in a week’s time and end in eight weeks, with an open mind to make a genuine attempt to find a solution. To prejudge the mediation process as doomed to failure can only scupper it. It may appear prima facie that the higher judiciary is hedging its bets or even ducking the huge responsibility of passing orders on a matter complicated by religious overtones. Regardless of the collective wisdom and their years of experience in jurisprudence, they were unlikely to have pleased all or even any one segment of the contending parties. As judges themselves said in obiter dicta recently, they cannot get into what Mughal emperor Babur may have done in erecting the masjid on the exact spot that Hindus claim is Lord Ram’s birthplace.
The composition of the mediation team with a total southern bias is understandable. Living in a region far away from the dispute, they could bring an even keel to the mediation process. However, the views of the spiritual guru in the panel are known to lean towards the Hindu viewpoint of a zealous clamour for the Ram Mandir, which is the reason why his nomination bristles with contradictions. The latest round of mediation comes after some attempts had failed in the past, particularly one by the Puri Sankaracharya, that at one point seemed promising. Those demanding a temple on the land may have their legal and faith-based claims, but history will record that the Babri Masjid’s demolition in December 1992 by religious zealots headed by a sprinkling of political leaders changed the Ayodhya narrative forever. It is against this background that we must see the centuries-old issue of a masjid and a temple now as a major bone of contention between people belonging to two religions. It is just as well that the court has ordered the strictest confidentiality in the mediation, which will be held in camera in Faizabad.
