After Ram temple, it’s time to ensure ‘roti’ too: Kalyan
LUCKNOW: Former UP CM Kalyan Singh, under whose regime the Babri mosque was demolished on December 6, 1992, on Monday said the November 9 SC judgment has paved the way for Ram temple and now there was a need to ensure ‘roti’ (employment for the people) too.
“Ram’s temple is assured now. It’s time to focus on ‘roti’ too and I am sure this aspect is also being looked into,” said Kalyan to newspersons here.
LUCKNOW: Former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Kalyan Singh, under whose regime the Babri mosque was demolished on December 6, 1992, on Monday said the November 9 Supreme Court judgment has paved the way for Ram temple and now there was a need to ensure ‘roti’ (employment for the people) too.
“Ram’s temple is assured now. It’s time to focus on ‘roti’ too and I am sure this aspect is also being looked into,” said Kalyan to newspersons here.
“The judgment is not about anyone’s victory or defeat. I am hopeful that a magnificent Ram temple would come up in Ayodhya, possibly by 2022 or 2023,” he said in his first presser after the Ayodhya verdict.
Kalyan figures among the BJP’s top leaders of the temple movement that is said to have pitch-forked his party to power.
Asked to comment on the SC observation of poor law and order on the day of the mosque demolition, Kalyan said he had paid the price for the “poor law and order.” “So, if law and order was bad (on the demolition day), I paid the price, too, by immediately putting in my papers the same day,” he said. Kalyan, the former Rajasthan governor, recently returned to Lucknow and lost the immunity he enjoyed as governor. He was then promptly named by CBI as an accused in the “criminal conspiracy” case of the mosque demolition.
“I am an accused, charged with criminal conspiracy, along with Advani ji, Joshi ji, Uma ji etc. There are around 39 witnesses against us out of which only seven have testified so far,” he said. Emphasising that he was always a “Ram bhakt”, Kalyan hailed the SC order and added that like millions of other “Ram bhakts”, he also favoured construction of a grand Ram temple, one that stands out for its grandeur and draws visitors from across the globe.
Asked for his views on the SC telling the government to provide 5 acres of land to Muslims for construction of a mosque, he said, “If the top court has said so, what remains to be said now. I am sure the government will provide the land for mosque in Ayodhya.”
When asked who would do the ‘shilanyas’ of the temple at Ayodhya, he said, “That is yet to be decided. Perhaps, the trust being set up, would finalise things. But then there is something that all of you must know. The ‘shilanyas’ per se had already been done in 1989 and it was a dalit who did it.”
Kalyan was referring to
Kameshwar Chaupal, a dalit, who had laid the first stone as a token ‘shilanyas’ in 1989, soon after the then Congress government ordering opening of the locks of the Ram Janmbhoomi complex.
Kalyan, who also spent a day in prison after being held for contempt of the Supreme Court after the demolition, said, “It’s true that I was sent to jail for contempt by the then chief justice MN Venkatachaliah, but against the popular notion that I was sent to jail for not being able to stop the demolition. The fact is that I had to spend a day in prison as the court felt that despite its orders I was unable to stop the ‘filling’ of a huge pit near the mosque by people with coarse sand and stones. I did try to stop that for two days but then ultimately I was, in the court’s view, unable to stop it and hence held for contempt.”
He also welcomed the setting up of a trust to oversee construction of the temple. “It’s a very good decision,” he said.
KALYAN, THE FORMER RAJASTHAN GOVERNOR, RECENTLY RETURNED TO LUCKNOW AND LOST THE IMMUNITY HE ENJOYED AS GOVERNOR