THE new sunday express MAGAZINE Voices Anand Neelakantan Sumeet Bhasin Sheila Kumar Neha Sinha Anuja Chandramouli Swami Sukhabodhananda Buffet People Wellness Books Food Art & Culture Entertainment january 21 2024 SUNDAY PAGES 12 People celebrate the Ram temple Thus Begins the Age of Ram From domes to dust, and from sleepy backwater of a newly independent country to centre of gravity of a 21st century nation, Ayodhya is where India’s new age begins T By Ravi shankar hat morning was cold and bright like invader’s steel. December cold. December 6, 1992, cold. Terraced buildings surrounded the crowded, barricaded square below the elevation upon which squatted Babur’s bloody legacy; its yellowed walls invaded by insolent vegetation, its three domes blackened and age-spotted. The terrace of the building facing it brimmed with a restless crowd; men, old and young, wearing saffron headbands, jostling for a glimpse of the domes of atavistic hatred. It was D-Day Demolition Day The air was charged with the static . . of history As the slogans of ‘Jai Shri Ram!’ reached a pitch the crowd became one, . in body and spirit. The excitement was infectious. A young man, wearing a saffron headband and a saffron gamcha around his shoulders raised his fists to the sky . Suddenly there was no stopping the crowd. It surged uphill, scaled the walls and , clambered on to the domes. Young men planted saffron pennants on all three cupolas, and the assault began. An old man, with his grandson on his shoulders, did a little jig on the terrace. Pointing at Babur’s mosque which crouched above holy Ayodhya like an ancient insult, he cried out, “Look beta, Ram Lalla is being freed.” Tears streamed down his wrinkled cheeks. The boy did not understand his grandfather but clapped his little hands nevertheless. I grabbed a saffron gamcha from the teenager next to me. I wound it around my head and rushed down to join the wave of kar sevaks scaling the rise. I was participating in unprecedented history . Inside, the domes wept dust. The air was thick with pulverised debris and falling mortar. A sadhu’s figure emerged in the smoky haze, hair wild and untied, beard fanned out like white fire as he struck at an already crumbling wall with a gleaming trident. His eyes were fiery with triumph. He thrust the trident forward and screamed, “Come on son, grab this! Strike! Strike, in the name of Ram!” The blows struck then; tridents, pick-axes, hammers and even bare fists brought down a hated symbol of Islamic conquest. The domes were gone. The sky was clear. Ayodhya lay spread below, dreaming of resurgence. Three decades and a change later, a grand, sprawling edifice of pink Bansi Paharpur stone is rising up to erase old memories of shame and redeem the past. A group of sadhus wandering on a gigantic maidan on which makeshift yagyashalas of various ashrams stood, looks happy like children unexpectedly given candy. One of them, gap-toothed, a smile showing through a thick confusion of white moustache and beard, declares grandly, “The Ram temple is the victory of Hinduism. What we began that day has borne fruit.” He had participated in the demolition when young. The group had come to Ayodhya from various parts of Uttar Pradesh: Gorakhpur, Chitrakoot, Shahjahanpur—Ayodhya unites people. “Anyone who comes here on these days are blessed, they must have done a lot of punya in their past life,” is another’s opinion. The portly Lallu Singh, the government contractor-turned MP from Faizabad squats on a charpoy in a shed of his godown and echoes their sentiment. “Prabhu Shri Ram is the embodiment of Hindutva, which is now gaining significance in the country Bharat . used to be the jagat guru of the world, it was a ‘sone ki chidiya’. The upcoming temple is a step towards reiteration of that age-old ethos,” he said. His workers, busy attaching saffron pennants to iron rods for the occasion, nod in agreement. The city is a canvas of colours. Yellow kites emblazoned with Ram’s weapons frolic in the crisp air. Schoolchildren draw rangolis on the pavements. The hawks observe it all, riding the thermals far above, and the memory of Jatayu comes unbidden to the mind. January 22 is Hinduism’s biggest day of the century All of . Hindutva’s main organisations are on sacred steroids, preparing Ayodhya for its holy hour. Up to four lakh pilgrims are expected by the weekend and all arrangements have been made for their stay Numerous bhandaras have . been set up; food and drink is free. The Sundar Kand is being recited continuously at all holy sites. The RSS has deployed hundreds of its cadres to ensure all arrangements go without a hitch. The VHP is present in force, both symbolically and literally . At Karsevakpuram, the outfit’s Ayodhya HQ—a poster of Ashok Singhal greets you with folded hands at its entrance. The great bells—made of ashtadhatu, an alloy of eight metals—to be installed inside the Ram temple await their hour. The largest bell weighs 2,400 kg and the seven others weigh 51 kg each. Observing the “It isn’t only the VHP which is celebrating. All Hindus are. Most important is the fact that Lord Ram has been installed in every Hindu’s heart.” Alok Kumar, VHP President ongoing frenetic work to finish the Singh Dwar where the red carpet to receive Ayodhya’s exalted visitors starts, it becomes obvious that Uttar Pradesh’s austere chief minister Yogi Adityanath—he still sleeps on the floor—means business. Special DG (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar elaborates on the immense security challenge which is being handled effectively “There is round-the. clock security in Ayodhya on January 22. All the roads from Lucknow, Varanasi, Prayagraj, Gorakhpur and Gonda will be sealed, creating a ‘green corridor’,” he says. Yogi has razed all previous reminders of history’s toxic memories in Ayodhya. Instead of the slaves of Babur’s commander Mir Baqi, the temple is being erected by a legion of workers in crash helmets and windproof jackets. Gigantic iron scaffolds dominate the skyline and massive earthmovers and bulldozers rumble about raising dust. The temple itself is vast, occupying all of 2.77 acres. It is not only the politicians or itinerant sadhus who are satisfied about the final outcome of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement which the VHP began in the 1980s, and Advani’s Rath Yatra imprinted on the national consciousness. The organisation’s soft-spoken, iron-willed international president Alok Kumar who has refashioned its unruly image into a Hindutva political force, is jubilant—on December 21, 1992, in Faizabad, Advani had expressed the opinion that the VHP was a fringe outfit. Kumar exclaims, “It isn’t only the VHP which is celebrating. All Hindus are. Most important is the fact that Lord Ram has been installed in every Hindu’s heart.” Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh which is the heart of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, is the first introduction to Ayodhya. The city is in celebration mode. Its streets are festive with colourful illumination; every wall and bunting bears images of Ram, Modi and Yogi. Ram is everywhere, both as a godly warrior slaying evil and a serene king protecting the idealistic nation. Saffron Yogi Adityanath performs a puja “When we talk of Ayodhya then everyone agrees that it is a matter of belief. Someone can call it votebank politics, someone will say it is an attempt to please certain sections of society. When someone asks me about this issue, I can say that Ayodhya is a means of re-establishing India’s lok astha and jan vishwas.” Yogi Adityanath, Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh pennants imprinted with his image and the salutary slogan flutter in the wind. Meanwhile, a random poster welcoming Bhupendra Modi— a local wit suggested he put them up himself—the man who filed the petition to get Rahul Gandhi disqualified from the Lok Sabha provides some comic relief. At the entrance to new Ayodhya on Ram Path, stand two large back-to-back statues of Hinduism’s most worshipped warrior god, welcoming and bidding a safe journey to visitors. Dharma Path sports all the signs of a New Age metropolis: 470 massive solar streetlights shaped like yellow suns and straddling tall, engraved columns look futuristic in this timeless town. “The CM’s intention is to make Ayodhya a global city reveals Kumar. ,” The Ramayana is a recurrent theme that runs through the capital of Ram Rajya. Scenes from the epic depicting various adventures of its divine hero are displayed in murals along the highway and the town: Ram consecrating a Shivalinga by the sea for it to part; the slaying of Shurpanakha in her demonic form; Jatayu’s last stand. Billboards advertise Ram Kathas by many veterans and ashram heads. One was going on to the rapt attention of a large group seated in an expansive, newly-erected auditorium at Bhaktmall ji ki Bagiya. Despite the Shankaracharya controversy, Modi is seen by Ayodhyaites as a yogi adept at performing the arcane rituals of Hinduism and yoga. “Never in the history of Ayodhya has a king consecrated a temple as was the custom in the old days,” observes Vimalendra Tiwari, a shopkeeper who plies his trade by the Naya Ghat on the Saryu River. “Now that too will be completed in Ayodhya,” he says referring to the prime minister. On January 22, Narendra Modi, the mascot of new Ayodhya, marks a new milestone in his journey as the torchbearer of global Hinduism. The Ram temple is guaranteed to bear his imprimatur as god’s supreme warrior in the Modiayana of the future. Since Modi’s visit to Ayodhya just over three years ago, work to transform the town into a modern city is proceeding at manic pace in three 24/7 shifts. Supercop Prashant Kumar, who is part of the committee that oversees the reconstruction, says, “Ayodhya was a sleepy little town. The government has made it vibrant, by widening roads and scaling up infrastructure. The public is participating in the effort. Ayodhya looks after its wellbeing.” Before 2019, Ayodhya was just a small town which occupied a mere four sq km of land; now it has spread to 63 sq km. The city plan of modern Ayodhya is based on the proto-structure of the ancient town and is constructed along the line defined in the Atharva Veda. Interestingly no street, building , or public place will be named after any character from Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas, but are being taken from the Vedas. Central Ayodhya, which is seeing most of the reconstruction is choked with traffic, though surprisingly well Turn to page 2