Babri demolition: What the BJP vs Sena vs Sena row brings up

More than that though, it is competitive politics over the Babri demolition – that followed barely 48 hours after the Ayodhya pilgrimage – that points to the tussle over Hindutva spoils between the allies (now split three-ways, counting the Uddhav Thackeray-led Sena).

The war of words was sparked by senior BJP leader and Higher and Technical Education Minister Chandrakant Patil, who is not known to measure his words, saying the Shiv Sena had no role to play in the demolition of the mosque.

The Uddhav Sena hit back, calling it an insult to the memory of Bal Thackeray – the Sena supremo at the time – forcing the Shinde Sena too to join the issue. Finally, Patil came up with the explanation that – “In the kar seva at Ayodhya, nobody participated as a member of any political party. Everybody who assembled at Ayodhya on the day of the Babri Masjid demolition participated as a Hindu committed to Ram temple. It was under the leadership of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad… What I said was based on facts. There was no distinction between ‘Sena’ and ‘non-Sena’ workers at the site.”

Patil also used the statement to pitch his own role in the demolition, saying: “I was deployed there for months to oversee the concerns of kar sevaks.” Apart from the VHP, he mentioned Sangh Parivar outfits such as the Bajrang Dal and Durga Vahini as being part of the demolition.

While the BJP seems to have opted for prudence and a hasty burial of the row, it does dig up some gold ghosts for the party.

On December 6, 1992, when Babri was pulled to the ground by kar sevaks, in the presence of BJP stalwarts such as L K Advani, Bal Thackeray was far from the spot at his residence in Matoshree, Mumbai. A few Shiv Sainiks such as Satish Pradhan were known to be in Ayodhya, but the party at the time was almost entirely focused on Maharashtra – or rather, Mumbai — issues.

But then, shortly after the demolition, as questions began to be raised over how the mosque was razed despite a huge security deployment, and the BJP state government’s role in it, senior BJP leader Sunder Singh Bhandari stated: “The demolition was by Shiv Sainiks.”

Bal Thackeray quickly moved in. “If my Sainiks have demolished the Babri Masjid,” he said, “I am very proud of them.” But even the intrepid Sena chief was careful to slip the “if” in, not making an outright claim.

Thackeray’s assertion at a time when the BJP was trying to put some — but not too much – distance between it and the Babri demolition, gave the Shiv Sena a new, militant Hindutva identity. This was further cemented in the communal riots that followed in Mumbai after the demolition, in December 1992 and January 1993. More than 900 people died in the riots, with Sainiks accused of playing an active role in them.

With serial bomb blasts hitting Mumbai soon after, in March 1993 – in an apparently retaliatory strike – the Sena grabbed the opportunity to fill the need for a party catering to Hindu fears, apart from those of the Marathi Manoos.

A senior BJP leader requesting anonymity said that there was some tension in the years following the Babri demolition when the party’s fortunes surged. “A section within the VHP, Bajrang Dal and others felt they had put in the work and sacrifice for the demolition, but the BJP had taken all the credit.”

However, over the next 25 years, this never came between the BJP and Shiv Sena as the two parties were close allies at the Centre and the state. The BJP also acceded to the Sena as the senior partner in Maharashtra.

That changed with the BJP’s resurgence after the rise of Narendra Modi, with the tension eventually leading to their separation post-2019 Assembly polls. The Sena split, with the Uddhav side going with the NCP and Congress and the Shinde faction finding succour in the BJP, followed from that.

This has left both Uddhav and Shinde keen to project that they are no less a Hindutva leader – the former due to his new company, and the latter due to his split from the Thackeray family. It was against this backdrop that Shinde was seen to have planned his Ayodhya pilgrimage.

With the Shiv Sena’s traditional symbol of bow-and-arrow (allotted to the Shinde faction) front and centre, the CM was seeking to send a message both to the Sena’s Hindutva base and the Sena’s grassroots cadre, who have been reluctant to dump the Thackerays.

The BJP earlier played along, but then there appears to have been a rethink. Hence, Fadnavis joining the CM for the maha aarti at Ayodhya. A senior Shinde faction minister admitted they were surprised. “In the original plan, only the CM was to tour Ayodhya.”

Fadnavis explained his presence claiming: “As a kar sevak, I have been to Ayodhya in the past. But visiting the temple and seeing the dreams of Ram bhakts realised were heartening.”

Following Patil’s remarks over the Sena and Babri demolition, Uddhav said: “Eknath Shinde, who claims to walk in Bal Thackeray’s footsteps, should show the courage to resign and walk out. Is he willing to swallow insults to Balasaheb Thackeray?”

Shinde himself jumped in to control the damage, saying: “It was Bal Thackeray who displayed absolute commitment to the Ram temple at Ayodhya. He was the leader who said ‘Garv se kaho, hum Hindu hain’. Nobody can undermine nor question the role of Balasaheb or Sainiks in the Ramjanmabhoomi movement.”

The BJP fielded its state president Chandrashekhar Bawankule to disown Patil’s remark. “It is his personal view,” Bawankule said, ruling out any differences between the partners.