Babri Masjid, the Liberhan Report and the BJP

New Delhi: The Liberhan Commission Report on the Babri mosque demolition has beentabled after 17 years in Parliament. The decision to table the 900-pagedocument along with an Action Taken Report (ATR) in Parliament wastaken at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning.

Home Minister PChidambaram tabled the report along with the government's Action TakenReport (ATR), but the question now: will there be any punitive actionbased on the report?

Thegovernment's ATR does not recommend any punitive action against these68 persons, in fact, it doesn't single any of them out. The LawMinister says the Liberhan Commission was a fact-finding commission andhas told NDTV to expect follow-up action based on the commission'sconclusions.

TheATR also says the government is contemplating a bill to check communalviolence. The Liberhan Commission calls for a special separate lawproviding for punishment for misusing religion to acquire politicalpower.

Therewere unruly scenes in the Rajya Sabha immediately after the homeminister tabled the report. BJP leaders raised slogans, members rushedinto the well of the House. There was a scuffle between BJP andSamajwadi Party members and the Upper House was adjourned.

OnMonday, NDTV reported exclusively on the contents of that report - an unsparing indictment ofthe BJP's most senior leaders - which was originally to be tabled in Parliamentnext month.

The fact that the media had access to thereport before it was shared in Parliament led to the entire Oppositionuniting to declare this was a breach of protocol. The Home Ministersaid that there are two copies of the report, one is with thegovernment, and that nobody in his Ministry leaked the Liberhan Reportto the press. The BJP Parliamentary Board met on Tuesday morning to discuss its strategy.

The Liberhan Report, which examines who was responsible for the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, describes it as "a tailor-made exercise", fueled and then executed with the complete knowledge of the BJP - and "one of the most abhorrent acts in the history of the nation."

The demolition was "neither spontaneous, nor unpreventable," states the report, adding that the BJP "misled" the Centre and then prime minister Narasimha Rao, by making "false promises" that the mosque would not be demolished. The report says the central government's failure was that it was "day-dreaming", and believed the BJP's assurances.

Kalyan Singh's role
The report is especially severe in its criticism of then UP chief minister Kalyan Singh, accusing him of forcing his administration into "ineffectiveness", and refusing paramilitary forces from the Centre till after the demolition.

The report finds that:

• Kalyan Singh had full knowledge of events and their implications
• Kalyan's "passive and active conduct" forced administration into "ineffectiveness".
• Kalyan Singh refused empower magistrates to use paramilitary forces
• He refused frantic calls from officers on the ground requesting help from paramilitary officer

The BJP, RSS and VHP
Of Kalyan Singh's colleagues and seniors in the BJP, the report says the BJP created a "time-saving facade" to "lull centre into inaction." Justice Liberhan says in his report that there was no difference in the agendas of the BJP and its parent body, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS). So Liberhan describes the BJP as little more than a "frontal organisation" for the RSS.

The logistical arrangements for demolition were co-ordinated between the BJP, VHP, RSS, the report notes. The role of the BJP "cannot be limited to mere support", it says. Further, BJP and Shiv Sena states, it finds, used official resources to mobilise Kar Sevaks who were "urged" into demolition by the "language of Ram Janambhoomi movement leaders."

The seniors: Vajpayee, Advani and others
Neither Atal Behari Vajpayee nor L K Advani is singled out for indictment in the report, but the report says the BJP leaders who appeared before the Liberhan Commission were "totally unrepentant." Advani had deposed before the commission, but Vajpayee didn't. The report says witnesses who appeared before the Commission "consistently protected" Advani, Vajpayee, and Murli Manohar Joshi. A day before the demolition, Vajpayee had left Ayodhya. 

But Justice Liberhan lists Vajpayee among the 68 people culpable of leading the country to the brink of communal discord, along with L K Advani and Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray. Liberhan indicates that he feels Vajpayee's absence during the demolition was pre-planned: "It was obvious some leaders were kept out to preserve secular credentials."

Justice Liberhan talks of the cartel behind the demolition including Ashok Singhal, Vinay Katiyar, Lalji Tandon, Kalra Mishra, and Govindacharya, led by Kalyan Singh and "supported by L K Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and A B Vajpayee."

The report says on December 6, 1992, L K Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Vijayraje Scindia made "feeble requests" to Kar Sevaks to come down. The "hidden intention of one and all" was to accomplish demolition, says Liberahan, adding the icons of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement could "just as easily" have prevented the demolition.

BJP's second rung
The report says there's "no doubt that the second rung of BJP was involved in the actual demolition" - the second rung includes leaders like Kalyan Singh, Uma Bharti and Vinay Katiyar.

Uma Bharti, who like Kalyan Singh has quit the BJP since but was a very prominent face in Ayodhya on the day of the demolition, has called the report ridiculous.

She said Murli Manohar Joshi and she had appealed to Kar Sevaks but "it was impossible to stop 5 lakh people, they were very agitated". Uma also dismissed the charge that the demolition was premeditated, saying had it not been spontaneous, why would the very senior leaders have been there?

BJP leader Vinay Katiyar too denied that the party had planned the demolition. He blamed the entire demolition on the Congress government ate the centre then. He, however, made clear that he did not share L K Advani's view that the bringing down of the mosque was a sad moment, and said, "It was the the proudest day of my life."

 The Babri Mosque was demolished on December 6, 1992, and the Liberhan Commission was set up 10 days after the incident. The panel submitted its report on June 30 this year, after 17 years and 48 extensions.