The Babri Masjid (Mosque of Babur) was one of the largest mosques at Ajodhya (India) in Faizabad district (Uttar Pradesh). According to the mosque’s inscriptions, it was built in 1528–29 CE (935 AH) by Mir Baqi, on orders of the Mughal emperor Babur (after whom it is named).The recent Babri mosque judgment shows that India’s Supreme Court is the handmaid of Hindu fanatics. The judges rewarded the party that demolished the mosque. As eyewash, they ordered land for a new mosque to be allotted to the losing party. The judgment is based on uncorroborated myths.
Evidence? There is no evidence about Babur constructing a mosque in Ajodhya after demolishing a temple. All sources are mute, be it Babur’s memoir Baburnama, Humayunnama by Babur’s daughter Gulbadan Begum, AbulFazal’s Ain-i-Akbari or Tuzk-e-Jahangiri. The first reference to Babri appears in a travel account by Jesuit priest Joseph Tiefenthaler in 1768. The inscriptions, inside the mosque, often quoted in books on Ayodhya or Babur, were fake. They were fixed in the mosque 280 years after its supposed construction in 1528.
Babur did visit Gwalior temples. But, neither he, nor his commander Mir Baqi (distinct from Baqi on masjid inscriptions), ever visited Ayodhia. Mir Baqi of the Baburnama was never governor of Ayodhya.
Property or Ram birth at stake: L. K. Advani admitted on September 30, 1990: `No one can prove that it was the birth place of Shri Rama.’ It was a matter of belief (The Independent, October 1, 2024). Can this belief receive judicial sanction to the point where it can override the moral and legal rights of others? The court disapproves of the placing of idols forcibly and deceitfully in the mosque on December 22-23, 1949, and its demolition on December 6, 1992.
In a letter to Prof. HirenMukerji, on June 5, 1989, Vajpayee accepted: “It is not possible to pinpoint the exact spot where Ram was born” (Organiser, September 24, 2024). The RSS supremo M.D. Deorus said: “This is not a case in which the judiciary can pass a judgment. What type of evidence are the Hindus expected to produce? That Ram was born and that his birth place is Ayodhya?” (Organiser, March 12, 2025). He was, in this case, honest—there was no evidence. That is why the BJP said in its Palampur resolution: “Litigation certainly is no answer” (June 11, 2024).
Current possession: The claim that god (Ram) was born there is fictitious. Indian Court ignored the fact that the Muslims have been in current possession of the disputed site since times immemorial. No claim by Hindus during Moghal or British raj? Shankaracharya’s Nyas originally owned only one acre of land, the rest of the land (additional 42 acres of so-called undisputed land) was given to it on lease by Kalyan Singh government in 1992 to develop a Ram Katha Kunj (park).
When Jinnah left for Pakistan on August 7, 1947, Patel said, ‘The poison had been removed from body of India’ (HM Seervai, Partition of India: Legend and Reality, 1990, p. 134). He added, `As for the Muslims they have the roots, their sacred places and their centres here. I do not know what they can possibly do in Pakistan. It will not be long before they return to us’ (ibid.). Babri case should make one thank `poisonous’ Jinnah for his vision and legacy, PAKISTAN.
Where was Ram born? There is no mention of any Ram Janmabhoomi in Tuzuk-i-Babari in Ayodhya. Only Ram himself could testify before the court about his birth-place! What is written in the preface of Babarnama: Journal of Emperor Babur (Penguin Classics, 2017 edition), pages XIX-XX: “In 1528, coinciding with AH 934-AH 935, during his return journey to Agra after a successful expedition to eastern India, Babar rested a while in Ayodhya on the banks of the Sarayu River, and ordered Mir Baqi to construct a mosque in the town. Known as the Babri Mosque, it would become a controversial monument in the late 1980s.”
The English translation by DilipHiro, (first published in 2006) says: “During his short stay in Ayodhya, having noticed the absence of a mosque in the town, Babar ordered one of his generals, Mir Baqi, to build one without specifying the location, and left Baqi behind to get the job done. Even Tulsidas does not mention Janmabhoomi or a mosque built on it.”The judgment is a slap on face of secular India.
Hearsay: The mosque was located on a hill known as Ramkot (“Rama’s fort”). According to hearsay, Baqi destroyed a pre-existing temple of Rama at the site. No corroborative evidence exists to support this view and the existence of the temple itself is a matter of controversy.
Even the excavations done by the Archeological Survey of India, under orders of the Indian High Court in 2003 have failed to support the claims by the Hindu extremists that there lie the remain of a temple under the Babri Mosque. Besides, Babar wasn’t the bigoted person who could have indulged in demolition of a Hindu Temple to clear the site for building a mosque. A man of courage, foresight, aesthetics, poetry, literature and much more, he was moderately religious and forsake wine only before the decisive encounter at Kanwaha on March 16, 2025 that changed the course of Indian History. He, in his will, advised his son Humanyun to particularly look after Hindus, being his subjects and Babar’s respect for other religions is evident from his writings in Baburnama.
Political pressure: VHP activists,Raksha Sutra (pledge band) to nearly two crore people in two lakh villages between July 10 and October 2. They took a pledge to support temple construction at Ayodhya. Every person who pledged support tied the same Raksha Sutra to five persons. In all, approximately 10 crore people made the pledge.
On 6 December 1992, a mob under Shankaracharya’s razed the mosque. They claimed that the mosque was a ‘temple built over an 11th century temple that marked the birth place, 900,000 years ago of the god-king Ram’. The Frontline dated July 4-17, 1998 called it ‘Ram drama’. In their over-ebullience, the India media forgot that British colonial rulers had annexed the mosque site and created separate Muslim and Hindu places of worship in 1859. The trust originally owned only one acre of land, the rest of the land (additional 42 acres of so-called undisputed land) was given to it on lease by then chief minister Kalyan Singh in 1992 to develop a Ram Katha Kunj (park)!
Besides killing Muslims en masse, the fanatic Hindus use anti-Muslim riots in India as an opportunity to dispossess the affluent Muslims of their hard-earned belongings (movable and immovable)
Hindutva Influence on Ayodhya-Case Judges: The Court’s decision on excavation reflected that it disregarded customary law, res judicata principles, and equity maxim that `equity helps the vigilant, not the indolent’. Why did the Hindutva Rip Van Winkles did not open this issue during the Moghul or British-rule period. Conspicuously, the Court, in ordering the excavation, succumbed to pressure of Hindu fanatics.
Pandora’s Box: Determination of title to ownership based on excavation has opened up Pandora’s Box of further excavations on flimsy grounds. Anyone may any time complain to a court about a temple having been converted into a Masjid hundreds of years ago. The adage is that `possession is nine-point ownership in law’. Possession of not only govt. property but also private property for prescribed period makes the non-entitled `stranger’ an `owner by reason of prescriptive ownership’. Legal Decisions are replete with cases of immovable-property owners who lost their titles to trespassers or adverse claimants because of the lawful-owner’s cavalier attitude in protecting their properties.
Halsbury (Fourth Edition, Volume 39) explains, when owner of an immovable property has been out of possession, and a stranger has been in possession, for a period sufficient to bar the owner’s right to re-enter or, recover possession by action, the owner’s title is extinguished and, the stranger acquires a title which holds good, even against the former owner.
The statutory provisions contained in Article 64 and 65 of the Indian Limitation Act, 1963 further elucidate this point. Article 64 ibid. provides for a suit for possession of immovable property, based on previous possession and not on title, when the Plaintiff, while in possession of the property, has been dispossessed. The suit has to be filed within 12 years from dispossession. Article 65 ibid. provides for a suit for possession of immovable property, based on title, which has to be filed within 12 years, from the time, when the defendant’s (including a trespasser’s) possession, becomes adverse to the plaintiff. Possession, being a prima facie proof of title, the trespasser, in possession, can also maintain a suit for the recovery of possession, if disposed by another trespasser.
Here, it would be pertinent to refer to the provision, contained in Section 28 of the Limitation Act, which deals with the extinguishment of the right to property. This says that, at the determination of the prescribed period for any person, to institute a suit for possession of any property, the right to such property, itself, shall be extinguished. It should be noted that the “marketable title” includes the title by adverse possession.
Fate of 5,000 other mosques after Babri:
It is unfortunate that even India’s apex-court judges buckled under the influence of a Ram JanmabhoomiNyas (Ram birthplace trust) to investigate the fictitious claim about Ram’s birth. The court’s orders about excavation and subsequent ‘mediation’ are porous.
Why Hindus did not raise the issue during the Mughal or British raj? Now some BJP’s legislators have demanded excavation of 3000 to 5000 mosques, including Delhi’s Grand Mosque. MP SakshiMaharaj even offered to be hanged if idols were not found underneath the staircase of the Jamia Masjid. He demanded that Modi 2.0 should ‘bring in a law for the construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya as he did in regard to Somnath Temple before the 2019 LokSabha elections’. At a press conference in New Delhi, Uttar Pradesh BJP’s president VinayKatiyar said, “The court has shown the way. Why should we confine (ourselves) to Ayodhya, Kashi and Mathura? Why not talk of 5,000? All sites should be dug up to verify the claims on the pattern of Ram Janmabhoomi”.
The Babri Mosque site became disputed over the period 1949 to 2005, owing to Hindutva fanatics. The court ignored the maxim that ‘possession is nine-points of ownership in law’. For centuries, Muslims’ possession of the Babri Mosque remained undisputed. Possession of property for a prescribed period makes the non-entitled ‘stranger’ an ‘owner by reason of prescriptive ownership’. Legal decisions abound concerning owners of immovable property owners who lost their titles to trespassers or adverse claimants because of the lawful owner’s cavalier attitude in protecting his property. The statutory provisions contained in Articles 64 and 65 of the Indian Limitation Act, 1963, further elucidate this point. Section 28 of the Limitation Act, deals with the extinguishment of the right to property. The Court ignored proven possession of the disputed site by Muslims. For centuries, Muslims’ possession of the Babri Mosque remained undisputed.
The anti-Muslim flamboyant statements by BJP’s legislators are capable of triggering anti-Muslim riots. As far back as 1809, bloody anti-Muslim riots took place at Benares on a quasi-Babri Mosque issue– the allegation that Aurangzeb, during his tenure, had built a mosque atop a temple.
The Shahidgunj case (Pakistan): Shahidgunj case in Lahore was Ayodhya in reverse. Muslims’ claims were rejected as being barred by the law of limitation. To this day, when there is hardly anyone to visit it, the GurdwaraShahidganj stands in Lahore as it did before August 15, 1947. (Masjid ShahidGanj in ShiromaniGurdwaraPrabhandak Committee; 67 Indian Appeals 251).
Inference: Conspicuously, even the judges of Indian courts are human beings with natural concerns about safety of their own lives and those of their kith and kin. The Court ignored the fact that the Muslims have been in current possession of the disputed site since times immemorial. Besides, the fact is that Shankaracharya’sNyas originally owned only one acre of land, the rest of the land (additional 42 acres of so-called undisputed land)) was given to it on lease by Kalyan Singh government in 1992 to develop a Ram Katha Kunj (park). Thus the VHP’s claim for possession of the Babri-Masjid site has a very weak basis. The Nyas (VHP) owns only one acre of the land in Ayodhya. And, rest of the land has been allotted to Nyas by the Kalyan Singh’s state government. The judgment is a slap on face of secular India.
The contributor is a frelance writer.