Monks, large crowds call on Modi to help build Ayodhya temple
Dispute over site remains at core of tensions between Indian Hindu and Muslims
New Delhi — Dozens of Hindu monks and tens of thousands of followers, gathered under the banner of groups linked to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party, on Sunday urged the Indian government to help build a temple on the ruins of a 16th-century mosque. Causing a frenzy in a crowd of more than 200,000 people, Hindu seers made fiery speeches laced with religious overtones to demand action paving the way for a temple in the northern town of Ayodhya. In 1992 a Hindu mob tore down the centuries-old mosque in Ayodhya, triggering riots that killed about 2,000 people across India in one of the worst outbreaks of communal violence since the Partition of India in 1947. After the demolition of the mosque, both Hindu and Muslim groups petitioned the supreme court to help resolve the issue. The top court has sought more time to give its verdict. Modi’s governing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), or the World Hindu Council, and the...
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