On Saturday (6th July), Rahul Gandhi announced that the Congress and other parties in the I.N.D.I. Alliance has defeated the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, which culminated in the construction of the majestic Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.
He made the contentious remarks during his address to Congress workers in Ahmedabad city of Gujarat.
During his speech, the Gandhi scion said, “The movement which was initiated by Lal Krishna Advani and had its epicentre in Ayodhya has been defeated by the I.N.D.I. Alliance in Ayodhya.”
#WATCH | Ahmedabad, Gujarat: Addressing the party workers, Congress MP and Lok Sabha LoP Rahul Gandhi says, "The farmers of Ayodhya lost their land when the Airport was built. The people of Ayodhya were upset that no one from Ayodhya was invited to the inauguration of the Ram… pic.twitter.com/wslXqLiPyh
— ANI (@ANI) July 6, 2024
Rahul Gandhi was referring to the Ram Janmabhoomi movement of LK Advani, which helped realise the dream of re-construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.
It must be mentioned that the BJP lost the Faizabad Lok Sabha constituency to Samajwadi Party candidate in the 2024 Lok Sabha election.
This is not the first time that the Congress party or its leaders have talked about defeating the Ram Janmabhoomi movement or opposing the construction of Ram Mandir.
It may be recalled that ex-Congress leader Kapil Sibal fought the Ram Janmabhoomi case for the Sunni Waqf Board opposing the building of a magnificent Ram temple in Ayodhya. He had also employed cunning tactics to delay the decision in the Ram Janmabhoomi case till the 2019 elections.
Congress and its denial of existence of Lord Ram
Eminent Congress leader Shashi Tharoor had earlier claimed that no ‘good Hindu’ would want a Ram Mandir at the site of the disputed structure. Tharoor urged that one should only have the Ram Mandir in one’s heart.
Interestingly, the Congress-led UPA government filed an affidavit in 2007, decrying the existence of Lord Ram.
The affidavit read, “Valmiki Ramayana and Ramcharitmanas admittedly form an important part of ancient Indian literature, but these cannot be said to be historical records to incontrovertibly prove the existence of the characters and occurrences of events depicted therein.”
The affidavit was filed to register the UPA government’s opposition to the demand to scrap the Sethusamudram project as it would damage the Ram Setu.
