Dear MEL Topic Readers,
Ornate Indian Hindu temple will open on old mosque site
Of India’s 1.4 billion population, about 80% are Hindus and 14% are Muslims. Constitutionally, India, or Bharat, is a sovereign, socialist, democratic, and secular republic. Although India’s secularism has been upheld by the Supreme Court, it also has been challenged in recent years with some groups advocating for a more Hindu-centric nation, particularly since Narendra Modi, the leader of BJP, a conservative Hindu nationalist party, took power in 2014. Recently, an announcement was made to open an ornate Hindu temple on a highly disputed old mosque site in Ayodhya, the birthplace of Lord Rama, in the state of Uttar Pradesh in January next year, just three months before the next general election. It is the site where a centuries-old Islamic Mosque had been sitting until 1992 when right-wing Hindu mobs destroyed it with hammers and hands claiming that the mosque was built by having destroyed a Hindu temple. It led to widespread violence and communal riots across India, killing more than 2,000 people. When Modi campaigned for the 2014 general election, he promised to build a Hindu temple on this highly disputed site. After a long legal battle, the construction of the Hindu temple was upheld by India’s Supreme Court in 2019. How secular a democratic country can be if the vast majority of the population are believers of a certain religion?
Enjoy reading the article and thinking if secularism and democracy can coexist.
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/09/15/india/india-ram-mandir-ayodhya-modi-bjp-intl-hnk/index.html
Ornate Indian Hindu temple will open on old mosque site
Of India’s 1.4 billion population, about 80% are Hindus and 14% are Muslims. Constitutionally, India, or Bharat, is a sovereign, socialist, democratic, and secular republic. Although India’s secularism has been upheld by the Supreme Court, it also has been challenged in recent years with some groups advocating for a more Hindu-centric nation, particularly since Narendra Modi, the leader of BJP, a conservative Hindu nationalist party, took power in 2014. Recently, an announcement was made to open an ornate Hindu temple on a highly disputed old mosque site in Ayodhya, the birthplace of Lord Rama, in the state of Uttar Pradesh in January next year, just three months before the next general election. It is the site where a centuries-old Islamic Mosque had been sitting until 1992 when right-wing Hindu mobs destroyed it with hammers and hands claiming that the mosque was built by having destroyed a Hindu temple. It led to widespread violence and communal riots across India, killing more than 2,000 people. When Modi campaigned for the 2014 general election, he promised to build a Hindu temple on this highly disputed site. After a long legal battle, the construction of the Hindu temple was upheld by India’s Supreme Court in 2019. How secular a democratic country can be if the vast majority of the population are believers of a certain religion?
Enjoy reading the article and thinking if secularism and democracy can coexist.
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/09/15/india/india-ram-mandir-ayodhya-modi-bjp-intl-hnk/index.html
No comments:
Post a Comment