Many may not remember that when the Babri Masjid was destroyed by extremist Hindus on Dec 6, 1992.
KARACHI: Many may not remember that when the Babri Masjid was destroyed by extremist Hindus on Dec 6, 1992, the UN General Assembly was in session in New York. On hearing of this unfortunate incident, the Pakistan delegation met with foreign ministers of other Muslim countries and it was decided that the matter must be raised in the General Assembly. A number of foreign ministers of western countries expressed their condemnation and the Indian representative conveyed the assurance of then prime minister of India, Narasimha Rao, that the masjid would be rebuilt.
The (late) HM Seervai –former advocate-general of Maharashtra and an eminent constitutional lawyer – wrote a detailed article in The Economic Times on April 9, 1993, condemning the destruction of the masjid, where he observed: “The Babri Masjid must be rebuilt, and the prime minister gave that answer on December 7, 1992 — that he considered it his duty to rebuild the Babri Masjid. This duty cannot be evaded except at the price of national dishonour: by disregarding the Constitution and the law, and by substituting mob rule for the rule of the freely elected representative of the people of India.”
He also observed: “The masjid had been enjoyed openly and without interruption for over 350 years. This right is not capable of dispute even if it is assumed, for the sake of argument only, that there had been a Hindu temple on the site on which the Babri Masjid stood.”
It is not clear whether the commitment of the government of India for rebuilding the masjid was ever pleaded in the proceedings before the Allahabad High Court. Ms Romila Thapar, Mr Irfan Habib and a large number of eminent persons have raised their serious concerns because of the way history, reasons and secular value have been treated in the verdict.
For the present, I cannot comment on the judgment and the manner in which it has handled the situation, as the matter is to be finally decided by the Indian Supreme Court.
Anwar Mansoor Khan
Senior advocate
Supreme Court of Pakistan
Ex-Attorney General for Pakistan
Published in The Express Tribune, October 7th, 2010.
