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Power struggle in India started with Nehru, extended to BJP

IndiaPower struggle in India started with Nehru, extended to BJP

Mahatma Gandhi had proposed the Prime Ministerial position to be given to Muslims and the post of President to Hindus, but Nehru did not agree.

It is believed that no Indian Muslim seriously wanted India to be divided; however, due to the cunning conspiracy of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, barrister, politician, and the founder of Pakistan and the British, India was divided. Commonly spread over India is Jinnah and Muslim League were the only groups who wanted the partition of the country.

The reality is there were other groups also who wanted the country to be divided in the name of religion, which is why they did not make any effort to stop the division of India, though this truth is suppressed.

While Mahatma Gandhi was trying his best to keep the country united, he had also proposed to Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru that the position of Prime Minister should be given to Muslims and the post of President should be given to Hindus, but Nehru and his companions did not agree on this.

The Controversy of the Partition of India

Destiny was already written in the books and accordingly, India was partitioned which led to chaos, deaths, and raging riots all over the country. Millions of Indians were tragically displaced. More than one million people died in the stormy riots that broke out over the country. In the midst of the deep painful wounds of the partition, India saw the first ray of independence after 90 years on the morning of 15 August 1947 and the whole country united joyously to celebrate the freedom of India from the British.

Nathu Ram Godse

The ecstasy of the spirit of celebration faded when on 30 January 1948, a militant Nathu Ram Godse shot and killed Gandhiji at Birla Mandir in Delhi. After this cowardly act of Godse, the spirit of communalism in the country came to a standstill and the whole country was immersed in mourning Gandhi’s assassination.

Mandir Masjid Row in Ayodhya

After this, the dispute over the Mandir Masjid in Ayodhya, which had been lying cold for the last hundred years, became heated again in 1949 when an idol of Ram Lalla was placed inside the Babri Masjid. The Hindus said that the idol appeared on its own while the Muslims said that some people entered the mosque at night and placed the idol. When the matter reached the district administrator, he declared the mosque a disputed site and locked it.

After this massive controversial incident, surprisingly, there was complete peace in the country and the matter was confined to Ayodhya only. Although communal riots continued in many places in the country, these were not linked to the incidents of Ayodhya. However, sometimes there were minor talks between the two sides concerning the path of a procession, and other times, Hindu Muslim disputes exploded over local issues. However, the riots were never toxic and virulent enough to ruin the spirit of India.

The Rise of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad

In the 1980s, the Ayodhya issue suddenly stirred out of its slumber and became a heated issue and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and its affiliated organizations started a movement demanding the lock in the mosque be opened, giving Hindus the right to worship there.

During the 1980s, the Khalistan movement blazed suddenly spreading around Punjab and surrounding areas sparking up terrorist incidents on a large scale in the country. Due to this, the Ayodhya movement died down and could not accelerate with the operations of the Indian Army on the Darbar Sahib in Amritsar in 1984 which triggered the assassination of Indira Gandhi followed by the horrific large-scale massacre of the Sikhs as a backlash for Indira Gandhi’s assassination.

However, when a court in Faizabad in 1986 ordered the locking of the mosque, the militant movement to build Ram Mandir intensified.

The Mandal Commission

Efforts augmented nationally with Hindus pushing for the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya in 1990 when the then Prime Minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh accepted the recommendations of the Mandal Commission and stamped the power share of the deprived communities in the country. After the acceptance of this report, caste tensions stirred in an angry roar all over the country.

 Lal Krishna Advani’s Rath Yatra

Due to this sensitive situation, a big diverting issue was created to turn the attention of the people from caste tensions. The then BJP took the kamandal in its own hands to quench the fire of Mandal.

After that, a zealous Lal Krishna Advani’s Rath Yatra commenced, but when in Bihar, Lalu Prasad Yadav halted that yatra, the BJP withdrew support from the Third Front government, and mid-term polls were announced in the country. During that election, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by Tamil terrorists on May 21, 1991.

Lal Krishna Advani’s RathYatra created a whirlpool that accelerated a big win for the BJP, bagging 120 seats, but the wheels of fortune turned and the Congress formed the government with its allies, however, in some states, including Uttar Pradesh, the BJP government was formed.

BJP in Power in Uttar Pradesh

After the BJP came to power in Uttar Pradesh, on 6 December 1992, India started burning in the fire of communal riots when the Babri Masjid was demolished by the Vishva Hindu Parishad, BJP, RSS, and their affiliates.

(To be continued)

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11 – Eleventh Part

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14 – Fourteenth part

15 – Fifteenth Part

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17 – Seventeen Part

18 – Eighteenth Part

19 – Nineteenth Part

20 – Twentieth Part

21 – Twenty One Part

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