Ayodhya ghost

The Congress-led UPA government has finally decided to table the Liberhan Commission report on the Babri Masjid demolition and the Action Taken Report in Parliament today, according to newspaper reports.
The commission, probing the sequence of events leading to the 1992 demolition of Babri masjid in Ayodhya, has been one of the country’s longest running inquiry commissions. It has cost the government Rs 7 crore. But it remains to be seen whether the report will be acted upon, or will it remain just another voluminous, expensive document for posterity. Remember of the fate of the Sri Krishna Commission report on the 1992-93 Bombay riots (officially, it was Bombay then). Or the Nanawati Commission report on the Sikh Riots of 1984.
The report would, no doubt, throw up a lot of dust and grime. There is already a story of its “selective” leaks that has reportedly enraged the BJP.
But what will the report reveal? Or, let us put in this way. What more is the report going to reveal? And, how is it going to affect the political climate of a country, already plagued by corruption scandals, acute parochialism, bizarre post-poll tie-ups, and turbulent caste and communal equations. P.Chidambaram, Union Home Minister will, however, love to add to this list, his pet disgust, the Maoist movement.
The commission report is going to embarrass the polity as a whole. But will it endanger the fate of the leaders involved in the crime? An idealist trudging in a fool’s paradise will believe in such a fairy tale ending. Let us face the harsh realities of the Indian political and judicial system. Sure, it will make leaders and parties uncomfortable. But they are used to such discomfort, and will even use it as a weapon to garner sympathy.The report might embarrass the Congress as it was in power during the demolition with the late P.V. Narasimha Rao as its Prime Minister.
The BJP, already a beleaguered party fighting for survival at the national and state levels, will be in for some ruse shocks. An Indian Express report has already indicated what the commission report is going to be like.
The report, one might think, will erase Kalyan Singh, who was the BJP Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh when the crime took place, from the Indian polity. But will it? He quit the BJP and tried the caste card in Mulayam Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party. Now that the party has kicked him out, he is sending loud messages to the BJP leadership to let him rejoin the party. Our political system is full of such Kalyan Singhs, who shamelessly marry, divorce and then remarry into the same party or alliances.
The civil society is embracing apathy in the context of the political process. And, why won’t they? Our leaders and parties are juggling statements according to situations, giving hollow promises. Already, the voter turnout is shrinking, thanks to this apathy. But the political parties continue to play with words. L. K. Advani, leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, has said he was proud of his association with the Ayodhya movement but distressed by the demolition of the mosque. What does he mean by that? He has said no one expected that the mosque would be pulled down and that the leadership from the BJP, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or the Vishwa Hindu Parishad had tried to stop the demolition. Kudos to our leaders! They always come out with remarkable bytes.
Let us prepare ourselves for the rude reality. This commission, like many other commissions in the past, will create the usual storm in Parliament, will hog print space and prime time on television news channels, will become an issue, that too only for the approaching Jharkhand Assembly elections. The issue will eventually evaporate as our political parties will have nothing new to grind on the poll platform. Soon the report will be shelved for posterity and gather dust at government archives.