Uma tells Liberhan panel she didn’t see journalists attacked

Deposing before the Justice Liberhan Commission, Bharati said the journalists did not give her details of the attacks on them. Angry as they were, “they kept fighting with me and I kept on saying sorry, sorry,” she said, adding that she was truly “ashamed” of the attacks on journalists.

The Commission’s counsel, Anupam Gupta, making an oblique reference to the CBI’s allegation against Union Home Minister L.K. Advani, asked Bharati if any leader urged the kar sevaks to block the road to prevent para-military forces from reaching the spot.

Interestingly, Bharati responded neither with yes nor no. Instead, she said: “I can’t answer this.”

When Gupta questioned her about the instruments used to carry out the demolition, Bharati sarcastically said that a separate inquiry needed to be conducted on that subject, given its technical nature.

But when asked if it was possible for the kar sevaks to have demolished the huge stone structure without prior training, she again said: “I can’t answer this.”

In fact, Bharati adopted this rather ambiguous line of defence on a lot of important questions. She repeated it even when she was asked to explain if the leaders made any efforts, other than the alleged appeals on the loudspeakers, to stop the demolition.

Her deposition will continue tomorrow.

Earlier in the day, the Commission received a “crank” affidavit from one Ayodhya Prasad Tripathi who attacked everybody for not giving him credit for the demolition. Coming close on the heels of RSS chief K.S. Sudarshan’s bomb theory, Tripathi’s claim caused much mirth in the Commission as he demanded that he alone should be tried for the demolition.