32 Years After Babri Demolition, Hindutva Forces Want More; A Brahmin Takes Over the Reins of Power in Maharashtra; Not in National Interest to Talk About Arms Exports to Israel
A newsletter from The Wire | Founded by MK Venu, Sidharth Bhatia, Pratik Kanjilal, Tanweer Alam, Seema Chishti, Sushant Singh and Siddharth Varadarajan | Contributing writer: Kalrav Joshi, with additional inputs by Anirudh SK
Snapshot of the day
December 6, 2024
Sidharth Bhatia
The Babri Masjid was demolished in Ayodhya 32 years ago and in its place stands the consecrated Ram Mandir, which continues to see progress in its construction. On the other hand is the five acre-plot in nearby Dhannipur, which the government in 2020 allotted to the Sunni Central Waqf Board to construct a new mosque. Four years later, there is no mosque – only “some tent owners … drying their awnings”, farmers “grazing their cattle and a few pilgrims … coming to a dargah in the middle of the field”, reports Syed Moziz Imam of BBC Hindi. He speaks to officials of the Indo-Islamic Cultural Foundation trust formed by the Waqf Board, local residents and others to find out what is behind this lack of progress.
But it seems Babri was not destined to be the only mosque to be demolished; rather, it was only the first of many Muslim landmarks and monuments to follow. The slogan, “Babri to bas jhanki hai, Kashi Mathura baki hai” (Babri is only a sneak peek; Kashi and Mathura are yet to happen), attests to the longing of Hindutva groups that persists even today. A list of such monuments marked for demolition has been in broad public circulation for quite some time. This month, as part of a Hindu nationalist campaign in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal, a historic mosque named Shahi Jama Masjid was targeted by a Hindutva group. A court-ordered survey was conducted there, and at least six Muslims were allegedly killed in police action. Local Muslims were protesting against the survey team, which was accompanied by a mob chanting “Jai Shri Ram.” The Hindu nationalists also launched a campaign claiming that the historic Jama Masjid in the national capital, Delhi, and the Ajmer Dargah in Rajasthan were originally temples.
Read Seema Chishti’s essay on what was lost in the Babri Masjid demolition, more than thirty two years ago, and what remains.
Justice Nariman is forthright about the increasing demands to claim that historic mosques are actually old temples, which he says is totally against the Places of Worship Act.
A group of 101 farmers at the Shambhu border point between Punjab and Haryana managed to cross various obstacles but were ultimately halted by concrete barricades and security forces’ use of tear gas, reports Vivek Gupta, noting that as per reports four farmers have sustained injuries. Haryana authorities have also deployed water cannons at the border. The agitating farmers are looking to travel to Delhi in what they say will be a peaceful march in order to protest the Union government allegedly not fulfilling its promises made regarding minimum support prices. Adjoining the ‘Shambhu border’ is Haryana’s Ambala district, where authorities have imposed restrictions on mobile internet in some jurisdictions until December 9.
The Congress has demanded that Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla take action against BJP MPs Nishikant Dubey and Sambit Patra for using ‘derogatory’ language against Rahul Gandhi, reports Sravasti Dasgupta. While Patra said he had no compunctions about calling Gandhi a “traitor of the highest order” and said a “dangerous triangle” comprising “George Soros from America, some agencies in America” and the OCCRP investigative news organisation was trying to “destabilise India”, Dubey said:
“It is the job of opposition parties to constantly devise various strategies on how to derail the government. They are consumed by hatred, and with the help of foreign funding, are deeply involved in derailment against Modi ji and the government. A French media organisation, Mediapart, released a report stating that there is an organisation called the OCCRP, supported by the Soros Foundation, which is funded by the US government. The OCCRP’s work is to derail the Indian parliament, to not allow it to function.”
The MEA said that at foreign office-led talks between India and China yesterday, both sides “positively affirmed” the implementation of October’s disengagement deal and described this as “complet[ing] the resolution of the issues that emerged in 2020”. But former ambassador to China Ashok Kantha has found a few holes in the MEA’s rendition of events: he points out that just earlier this week, external affairs minister S Jaishankar said talks would shift to de-escalation and the effective management of border activities. Kantha notes these are
“… issues which emerged in 2020. There is continuing entrenched deployment of troops with heavy weapons. Does this become “new normal” [sic]?”
He also points to S. Jaishankar’s reference to “steps of a temporary and limited nature” in
“several pockets of Chinese intrusions. This reportedly involves denial of patrolling by Indian troops and grazing by Indian graziers in areas they were accessing until April 2020. Another “new normal”?”
“This categorical conclusion in MEA statement [sic] that “all issues that emerged in 2020” have been resolved is baffling to someone who was a border negotiator with China for nearly a decade,” he said in a thread on X.
Meanwhile, S. Jaishankar cloaked India’s arms export policy to Israel under the vague guise of “national interest,” refusing to confirm whether India has been supplying weapons during the ongoing Gaza conflict as that information “is not available in public domain”. When questioned in the Rajya Sabha, he conveniently cited national interest as the guiding principle, sidestepping any transparency on military exports. The minister also defended India’s controversial abstention from a UN resolution calling for a humanitarian truce between Israeli forces and Hamas, a move that many saw as tacit support for Israel’s actions. Jaishankar’s refusal to divulge details on military exports and the government’s diplomatic stance only deepens concerns about India’s alignment in the Middle East – prioritising opaque ‘national interests’ over humanitarian clarity.
Once mocked for declaring that he would return as Maharashtra chief minister, Devendra Fadnavis broke the deputy chief minister post’s so-called jinx and was sworn in for his third term as chief minister at Mumbai’s Azad Maidan yesterday. Eknath Shinde took oath as deputy chief minister, even as it was unclear a mere hours before the ceremony whether he would show up and accept the bumping-down. The two shared the stage with Ajit Pawar – who was also sworn in as deputy chief – but their body language and Shinde’s press conferences in the days before the ceremony indicated that all is not well in the Mahayuti.
Also present at the swearing-in ceremony among the audience were actors Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan and others, who watched on as a ‘devotional’ musician sang democracy’s strangest musical number yet – a Hindutva pop item about how “bhagwa [saffron] will once again be waved in Maharashtra”.
The Supreme Court granted bail to eight of the 16 former members of the Uttar Pradesh Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) whose acquittals by the trial court in the Hashimpura massacre case were reversed by the Delhi High Court. A bench of Justices A S Oka and A G Masih took note of their submission that they were suffering prolonged incarceration after the high court overturned their acquittal in 2018. The Hashimpura massacre occurred on May 22, 1987 when Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) personnel, belonging to the 41st Battalion’s ‘C-Company,’ allegedly rounded up approximately 50 Muslim men from Hashimpura, a locality in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, during communal tensions. The victims were taken to the outskirts of the city, where they were shot, and their bodies were dumped in a canal. The incident resulted in the death of 38 persons with only five survivors left to recount the horror.
In a press conference brimming with misplaced optimism, Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai declared that Manipur is on the “path of fast-paced development.” For a state battered by over 18 months of ethnic violence, displacement, and communication blackouts, the statement felt not just tone-deaf but almost surreal. One could only wonder – was he referring to the swift escalation of unrest or the rapid sufferings of hundreds? Rai’s comment might have been intended to inspire hope, but for those living through the state’s harsh realities, it came across as a punchline to a cruel joke. In Manipur today, “fast-paced development” is a bitter irony. Trust has crumbled, peace remains elusive, and yet, the audacity of such proclamations races ahead unchecked.
Meanwhile…
(Credit: Sajith Kumar in Deccan Herald)
As the rupee sinks to record lows, the Reserve Bank of India has turned to non-resident Indians (NRIs) to stabilise its faltering currency. By allowing banks to raise interest rates on NRI deposits, the central bank hopes to lure foreign exchange and stem the rapid depletion of its reserves, which have dropped by nearly $50 billion since September. Governor Shaktikanta Das has pledged to curb currency volatility, but critics see this move as reactive firefighting rather than proactive planning. The once-mighty reserves are dwindling under global pressures, and the reliance on diaspora dollars highlights a concerning lack of robust alternatives. The message is clear: the RBI’s playbook is running thin, and it’s now counting on NRIs to patch a problem decades of short-sighted economic policies helped create. Will this lifeline be enough, or is the rupee heading for rougher waters?
Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal yesterday ordered a ban on disseminating ‘hate speech’ made by Sheikh Hasina on social media and the mass media following a plea filed by the prosecution, local media reported. This comes days after Hasina reportedly attended an Awami League event virtually and said that while she was being accused of committing genocide, it was “the student coordinators and Yunus [who] are behind this genocide”. Muhammad Yunus yesterday met with various religious leaders in Dhaka and was cited as saying that minorities’ issues were being compounded by inaccurate media coverage.
Foreign secretary Vikram Misri will visit Bangladesh next week for foreign office consultations, the MEA confirmed today. Bangladesh’s foreign adviser had earlier said that the two countries’ foreign secretaries would meet in Dhaka and that while it was “very clear that we want a good relationship [with India]”, “...both sides need to want that and should work for it”. The talks will come at a time of heightened bilateral tensions – and a senior officer in Dhaka tells Sudhi Ranjan Sen and Arun Devnath that they could serve as an opportunity for a ‘restart’.
Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet has been awarded the Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development for 2024. The international jury of the Indira Gandhi Prize, chaired by Shivshankar Menon, former national security advisor and former foreign secretary, announced the award in recognition of Bachelet’s contributions to promote human rights, peace, and equality. “In her various roles as the founding director of UN Women, the UN high commissioner for human rights, and as president of Chile, she has spoken strongly for gender equality and the rights of the most vulnerable sections of the population at home and across the world. Her personal courage and example in standing for peace and the rights of marginalised people continue to inspire men and women around the world.”
The Dutch chip major NXP will invest part of its $1 billion R & D fund in Bengaluru, according to a commitment during a visit of a delegation of Karnataka’s Industries’ minister M B Patil to Europe. The visit was to promote a Global Investors Meet scheduled in Bengaluru in February. Interestingly, following an RTI filed in 2019, Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), which is headquartered in Bengaluru, had said that NXP makes the microcontrollers used in the EVMs it supplies to the Election Commission of India.
In a time when independent journalism in India faces growing challenges, the Paris-based press freedom organisation Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has recognised Ravish Kumar for his unwavering commitment to fearless and truthful reporting. Shortlisted for the 2024 Press Freedom Award in the Independence category, Kumar’s work continues to highlight the critical role of a free press in defending democracy and holding power to account.
Modi govt waived key costs to benefit Adani day before Andhra SECI deal
The Indian Express reports how the Modi government allegedly facilitated a lucrative deal for Adani Green and Azure Power by waiving key transmission charges just a day before Andhra Pradesh signed a Power Sale Agreement (PSA) with SECI. The Union power ministry’s November 30, 2021, order saved an estimated Rs 1,360 crore annually – or Rs 34,000 crore over 25 years – for the two firms, significantly benefiting the corporate giants.
Curiously, the order also diluted rules introduced merely a week earlier, removing commissioning deadlines and Renewable Power Obligation (RPO) compliance. Andhra Pradesh sealed the PSA on December 1, and SECI awarded Adani Green and Azure a whopping 12 GW project. Notably, Adani’s first 1,000 MW won’t even be ready until April 2025. Analysts have pointed to how SECI has chosen to remain silent – neither initiating an investigation, nor filing a complaint, nor providing any explanation. This action raises serious concerns over transparency and corporate favoritism in public policymaking.
Bharatiya Vayuyan Vidheyak Bill: MPs worry about Hindi imposition
During the debate in the Rajya Sabha over the Bharatiya Vayuyan Vidheyak Bill, which will replace the 1934 Aircraft Act if passed, some MPs took issue with the Bill’s name being in Hindi, with the Trinamool Congress’s Sagarika Ghose and the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam’s Kanimozhi NVN Somu saying it amounted to Hindi imposition. Union aviation minister Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu said that while some may find the Bill’s name hard to pronounce, that would be “nothing to be ashamed of” and that the Modi government was trying to “break the cocoon” India developed due to colonisation. Sravasti Dasgupta notes that Article 348(1)(b) of the constitution requires that the “authoritative texts” of Bills introduced in India’s legislatures (as well as Acts passed) be in English.
Choked Voices: Why Air Pollution Is Missing from India’s Pop Culture
In a nation where storytelling dominates public imagination, the absence of air pollution in Indian pop culture is “largely missing”, reports BBC with some nominal exceptions. Siddharth Singh, author of ‘The Great Smog of India’, laments that pollution’s lethal grip – responsible for millions of deaths annually – has barely left the realm of dry statistics and academic discussions. “When you say PM2.5 or NOx or SO2 (all pollutants), what are these words? They mean nothing to [ordinary] people,” Singh points out. Unlike poverty, corruption, or caste, air pollution has yet to find a compelling narrative in Indian literature or filmmaking. This disconnect, analysts suggest, may hinder the public from truly understanding its consequences.
The Long Cable
The return of the Brahmin in Maharashtra
Ashutosh Bharadwaj
A question follows the ascension of Devendra Fadnavis in Maharashtra: has the BJP subdued the dominant Marathas in the state’s politics, a treatment also meted out to the Jats in Haryana?
If Nayab Singh Saini is a rare non-Jat leader in Haryana to have triumphed over the powerful Jats, the return of Fadnavis marks a similar moment of a Brahmin prevailing over the studded marquee of Marathas.
Having already completed one full term as the chief minister, if Fadnavis remains at the seat for just around two more years, he will be the second longest serving head of the government in a state whose most power structures — from the polity and cooperative societies to sugar mills— continue be dominated by Marathas.
Despite considerable influence over the intellectual and artistic milieu in Maharashtra, Brahmins yielded significant political ground to the Marathas over the last century, more so after independence. The reason lies not in the numerical weakness of Brahmins in the state, but in the historical evolution of Maharashtra. In Uttar Pradesh, for instance, the Brahmins, similarly fewer like in the western state, dominated politics for a long time, before the Kamandal movement threw open the polity to the middle and lower castes 1980s onwards.
In contrast, Maharashtra has had a history of anti-Brahmin movements, first led by lower caste leaders like Jyotiba Phule and Dr B R Ambedkar, and later by the OBCs and middle castes, among whom was Prabodhankar Thackery, whose son later formed the hugely influential organization named Shiv Sena which brought numerous OBCs to its ranks.
Such caste movements politically weakened the Brahmins, and despite having pioneering community leaders like Mahadev Ranade, Gopalkrishna Gokhale and BG Tilak, Maharashtra barely saw the community at the helm after independence. Even when a Brahmin leader, Shiv Sena’s Manohar Joshi for instance, became the chief minister, the strings remained with Matoshree.
Significantly, the Hindutva movement in Maharashtra was led by Brahmins, through two distinct branches, one by VD Savarkar and the other by RSS sarsanghchalaks (chiefs). Being influenced by both, the Chitpavan Brahmin Nathuram Godse, was the most notorious ambassador of the ideology. It is in this context that several right-wing accounts point at what they believe was the ‘genocide’ of Brahmins after the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
The two branches barely converged for several decades, as not only the atheist Savarkar was firmly opposed to rituals like cow worship, he had reserved his unconditional and choicest abhorrence for the RSS. “The epitaph for the RSS volunteer will be that he was born, he joined the RSS and died without accomplishing anything,” was how Savarkar is quoted as saying, in Vaibhav Purandare’s biography of the Hindu Mahasabha leader. It is an irony therefore that Savarkar has become an RSS icon, an atheist, a champion of the Hindu right.
Amid such complexities is distinctly placed the tussle between the Brahmins and the Marathas, whose well-recounted origins can be traced since the era of Maratha rulers and their Brahmin ministers called Peshwas, who gradually became de facto rulers. The conflict carried forward to the contemporary polity, with Sharad Pawar once famously asking people whether they wanted the return of the Peshwai or the rule of the Brahmins.
It is here that one can credit Fadnavis for embracing the Marathas during his first term as the chief minister. The most notable of his steps was providing reservation to the Marathas under the Socially and Educationally Backward category. Similarly, his current ascension doesn’t rest on any perceived notion around Brahminical superiority, but by a carefully crafted campaign by the Parivar to stitch several lower and middle castes together.
That, however, has not been sufficient to dispel the distrust between the Marathas and the Brahmins. When the chief minister Fadnavis secured the Rajya Sabha nomination for Sambhaji Raje, a descendant of Chhatrapati Shivaji, Pawar quipped that once upon a time Chharapatis (Marathas) appointed the Peshwas, but now the Peshwas appointed a Chhatrapati.
Amid this, does the return of Fadnavis, which would not have been possible without the unflinching support of the senior most Nagpur pracharaks, mostly Brahmins, indicate the revival of the political clout of the community? Perhaps not so early. Neither one should hastily infer the slide of the Marathas.
But what can be safely concluded is that while the state’s social foundation successfully resisted the Hindutva movement led by the Brahmins over the last hundred years, it now registers decisive faultlines. A state that witnessed Uddhav Thackery moving away from the legacy of his father, has now succumbed to the sloganeering by leaders from UP and Gujarat.
In that sense, Fadnavis may now reflect a trait not so pronounced during his first tenure, a trait that should please both Savarkar and the influential second RSS chief M S Golwalkar. While most parts of the country have witnessed the OBC or subaltern Hindutva of late, Maharashtra may now offer a Brahmin Hindutva.
Reportedly
Why are Indian revenue officers retiring earlier? Dilip Cherian raises this question, pointing out that according to the government, 853 officials of the Indian Revenue Service have taken premature retirement. The same trend may well apply to IAS and IPS officers, he says. Attractive public sector offers may be one reason, but many of them feel constricted in a government that has become increasingly centralised.
Deep dive
Abhinav Sekhri writes on bail and judicial delays arguing that “bail has to be rooted in the ordinariness of statutory remedies if it has to be consistent and fair. It cannot be that relief to undertrials must depend on the personal sense of a superior court judge that the trial has dragged on for far too long.”
Prime number: 94,460 trees cut, 2,73,757 to goWhen asked how many trees were felled for the Parsa East Kete Basen mine in Chhattisgarh’s Hasdeo forest, Union junior minister for forests Kirti Vardhan Singh said 94,460 trees had been cut as of July and 2,73,757 trees have been marked for felling “for mining activities in the coming years”. Singh also said “53,40,586 trees have been planted as compensatory afforestation, mine reclamation and translocation”.
Opeds you don’t want to miss
Regarding the Supreme Court’s not halting the Babri Masjid’s demolition 32 years ago, Raju Ramachandran writes that “even the most charitable will find it difficult to say the court was naive. Ineptitude, incompetence and abdication would still be mild words to describe the court’s inaction.”
Manoj Kumar Jha, an RJD MP, reminds us that 32 years ago, the BJP and the Sangh parivaar did not just bring down a place of worship when they demolished the Babri Masjid, “it also rent asunder the social fabric of India.” “It represented a dangerous moment when sectarian forces overwhelmed the rule of law,” he says.
The campaign claiming that a Hindu temple lies beneath the Ajmer Sharif dargah is “not just a denial of India’s Muslim history: it is an assault on the history of India itself”, writes Anirudh Kanisetti.
Constitutional scholar G Mohan Gopal felt one of the conclusions of a CSDS-Lokniti survey from Kerala published in The Hindu in June was “arrived at on the basis of … questionable or hazy data” and could “drive a wedge between Muslims and the Ezhavas”, writes R Rajagopal. In light of Gopal’s failed attempts to reach the newspaper for clarity, Rajagopal writes that “conscientious readers like [Gopal], indispensable to preserve the credibility of newspapers, remind us of the need to reform ourselves and respond to readers at the earliest”.
“The truth” about the US justice department’s charges against Adani is that he “faces some of the most serious charges available under the US federal securities law, backed by what appears to be substantial evidence gathered through a lengthy investigation”, writes KV Dhananjay, who cautions against focusing too much on the fact that he has not been charged under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
The list of deaths due to contaminated drugs continues to grow, write Dinesh Thakur and Prashant Reddy T. The latest tragedy is the four maternal deaths in the Ballari district of Karnataka which is blamed on contaminated Ringer’s lactate solution. The Centre must reform the Central Drug Laboratory, they write.
Listen up
Milan Vaishnav and Hilal Ahmed discuss the latter’s new book A Brief History of the Present: Muslims in New India in this week’s episode of Grand Tamasha. The two speak “about “substantive Muslimness,” the meaning of Hindutva and what exactly is new in the “new India”.”
Watch out
Journalists Saba Naqvi and MK Venu join Sravasti Dasgupta for a discussion on the formation of Maharashtra’s new government, the developments in Sambhal and how it has brought back the Places of Worship Act back into focus, as well as the Assam cabinet’s decision to ban the consumption of beef in restaurants and public places.
Over and out
Tourists visiting Kashmir’s iconic Dal Lake, home to around 4,000 shikaras, can now glide across its serene waters with a modern twist – Uber has launched its first-ever boat-hailing service in India. Offering rides on traditional shikaras, the service blends the charm of ornate, canopied boats with the convenience of app-based bookings.
Abdul Salaam Dar, a 69-year-old fisherman from Lelhar Kakapora, a quiet hamlet along Kashmir's Jhelum River, has spent his life casting nets to make a living. But for the past 30 years, he has become something far greater – a fisher of people. While he sells his daily catch at local markets, Dar has also saved hundreds from drowning, pulling 47 corpses from the river’s depths. The Guardian has a profile of the “fisher of people”.
That’s it for today. We’ll be back with you on Monday, on a device near you. If The India Cable was forwarded to you by a friend (perhaps a common friend!) book your own copy by SUBSCRIBING HERE.