BJP, Cong trade charges over Liberhan report

The MS Liberhan Committee report to investigate into the demolition of Babri Masjid in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992, was tabled along with the Action Taken Report (ATR) on Tuesday in Parliament. There was furore over the mention of former prime minister and veteran Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee as a culpable party to the demolition of the Babri Masjid structure.

CNN-IBN debated the issue with BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad, Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari and Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) leader Ram Madhav.

CNN-IBN: Should Atal Bihari Vajpayee have been named in the Liberhan Commission report. Has the mask fallen off the former prime minister? He has been called a pseudo-moderate. He has been accused of making speeches that could have led to the communal discord. Vajpayee, the moderate, has had the mask removed. How do you react?

Ravi Shankar Prasad: Rajdeep, first and foremost, it is very unfortunate. Justice Liberhan has been a judge and remained as a Commissioner of Enquiry for 17 years only, with 48 extensions only, at Rs 10 crore expenses only. How could he miss the most elementary clause of the Enquiry Commission Act, Section 8B which clearly mandates that if you condemn any person, you must hear him, give him a notice? No order can be passed with prejudice. Vajpayee should be summoned or not was debated in 2003, the lawyer of the Commissioner has said earlier. It was pointedly rejected. Despite that, you do not give a notice to Vajpayee whose name was never mentioned by anyone. Yet you call him the iconic leader of the BJP and culpable along with 68 persons named therein. Now my charge is, with full sense of responsibility that this is a biased report. The name of Mr Vajpayee has been invoked in the patent violation of propriety and law, which has its own consequences.

CNN-IBN: Point taken. Manish Tewari, a very serious charge there being made by Ravi Shankar Prasad that the report is biased and Vajpayee's name should not have been included in it. How do you respond?

Manish Tewari: Well, Rajdeep Sardesai, this is not a report of the Union Government. The Union Government appointed a Commission of Enquiry. The Commission of Enquiry came to its own conclusions based upon the evidence that was before it. I think that only Justice Liberhan will be able to answer that question as to why the 8B process wasn't followed.

CNN-IBN: But Manish Tewari, the (then) prime minister gets a clean chit and Atal Bihari Vajpayee who claims that he was not even present there on December 6, is amongst them who some would say would say, as a result has been held culpable.

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Manish Tewari: Well, Rajdeep, the report itself answers the questions where it deals with the constitutional position as to how a Central government is expected to respond when the state government goes rogue. With the benefit of a 20/20 hindsight, we can say that possibly the Union Government at that point in time should not have taken the assurances of the (Uttar Pradesh) state government given to the Supreme Court and the National Integration Council at face value. But that is with a 20/20 hindsight. That brings you to a very constitutional question as to how a Union Government should act when face with a situation where the state government is saying one thing and doing exactly the other.

CNN-IBN: Ravi Shankar Prasad, former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has always claimed that he is distant from the Ram Janma Bhoomi issue. The fact is that on December 6, the Judge says he made a communal speech and that means that he cannot disassociate himself from the Ram Janma Bhoomi movement. Vajpayee, as an integral part of the BJP knew of the designs of the Sangh Pariwar.

Ravi Shankar Prasad: Well, Rajdeep, we have been named in the report and therefore let me explain, have some patience. I have gone through the report very briefly as well as the Action Taken Report. If Vajpayee is responsible, Advani is responsible, what has stopped the government from taking action against them in the ATR?

CNN-IBN: That is a good point. Manish Tewari, respond to that please. Why has the Congress decided to absolve him? Obviously, the Congress also has a problem with the report.

Manish Tewari: In so far action against Advani is concerned, the action has been taken when an FIR was registered against him and other leaders in 1992. The fundamental point here is that the former prime minister for whom I have the greatest respect was an integral part of the Bharatiya Janata party and the BJP as an organisation was in the forefront of the Ram Janma Bhoomi movement. They brought the people; they created the circumstances which finally led to the demolition of the mosque.

CNN-IBN: Why have you not acted on it and why has your ATR not named them? Were you afraid of opening up another flank which you do not want to?

Manish Tewari: In so far as Advani is concerned, I have already explained the situation. In so far as Mr Vajpayee is concerned, the ATR has to be read in the context of the concrete recommendations made by the Justice Liberhan Commission. My brief reading of the recommendations and the actions that flow out of it are that there was no concrete recommendation made by the report?

Will this report help Advani resurrect his career?

CNN-IBN: Will this report help LK Advani resurrect his career? This report in a sense could help the BJP to establish that it is the flag bearer of Hindutva. Is that what you want? A section of your party must be secretly delighted that all your leadership has been named.

Ravi Shankar Prasad: Well, Rajdeep, please do not interrupt me as it is very important that there are some facts that the entire country must know. Justice Liberhan is explaining the genesis of the movement. He does not take notice of the opening of the locks by the Rajiv Gandhi government. There is not a whisper about the shilanyas (foundation stone-laying) done by Buta Singh, the Home Minister of Rajiv Gandhi. Narasimha Rao's role is not mentioned at all, despite the public charge of Arjun Singh and Sitaram Kesari that he was equally responsible. I say you are while going through the process, deliberately and consciously ignoring vital facts that may have a bearing (on the outcome). I leave the conclusions to the consideration of your viewers. The second and equally important aspect is that you are saying that religion based parties ought not to be there. Now would a Judge heading a Commission of Enquiry consider the democratic credentials of the country? Have we grown so far due to the charity of Justice Liberhan? This democratic process should not be subverted and even the Supreme Court has repeatedly said that courts should not determine the democratic processes of the country.

CNN-IBN: Are you saying that Justice Liberhan was biased against the BJP and has allowed his ideology to influence his findings? Were your party leaders like Uma Bharti and Murli Manohar Joshi not celebrating?

Ravi Shankar Prasad: We all want a proper Ram Temple to come up after a consensus and by the law. But here we are discussing the report here. Justice Liberhan has said that Advaniji made 'feeble' attempts to stop the kar sevaks. I was present when Advaniji deposed before the Commission and I was a minister then. I have a copy of the same. He said that he first sent Uma Bharti, then Pramod Mahajan because a few people had been heard speaking in Marathi. He was himself willing to go but was stopped by the police. With all this evidence on the record, Justice Liberhan's report is fully tainted with culpable bias against the RSS and the BJP.

CNN-IBN: Why doesn't BJP take responsibility for the happenings on December 6 or do you chose to distance yourself from the movement?

Ravi Shankar Prasad: Rajdeep, let me be clear about it that we all want a glorious Ram Temple by the law. But here we are talking of a report by a lawyer who knows the law. It is my bounden duty to show the patent infirmity that has taken place. The Congress party that is talking of the report but it is the same party that banned a report by a celebrated Supreme Court Judge, the Shah Commission report on the excesses of Indira Gandhi. So the Congress has no right to point a finger at us.

CNN-IBN: Does the Sangh Pariwar take responsibility for the movement?

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Ram Madhav: Of course, we totally own up the movement. However, what happened on that day is not some thing anyone had anticipated or planned. We have to respect the sentiments of the people, is all that we said. But so far as this report is concerned, I would like to say that the more we get into the report the more ridiculous it seems to get. We just learnt that even Devraha Baba, a holy and respected saint who passed away in 1989, has been named in that report. He was projected as one of the conspirators. The credibility of the report is at its lowest ebb.

CNN-IBN: Did some of these leaders not make provocative speeches that led to the demolition?

Ram Madhav: It is ridiculous to completely absolve Narasimha Rao and to say that Vajpayeeji is a pseudo-liberal who provoked people and is responsible for the demolition.

CNN-IBN: Has Narasimha Rao been let off lightly by the Liberhan Commission Report? He was the prime minister, surely he could have stopped the demolition of the Babri Masjid? How can Narasimha Rao be let off so lightly? Is this where the politics of the Congress has played a part?

Manish Tewari: Are you making a charge that the Congress in any manner influenced the outcome of the report?

CNN-IBN: Well, I am only telling you that Ravi Shankar Prasad and Ram Madhav say that it is ridiculous that Narasimha Rao is let off in this way as not culpable. He is not involved but when it comes to Kalyan Singh or Atal Bihari Vajpayee, they are involved. How do you explain the distinction? Surely, the prime minister of the country would have been able to stop the demolition of the mosque.

Manish Tewari: Are the BJP leaders on the same page on the issue? Prakash Javadekar, on another television show with me said that the events before 1985 do not matter. The issue of the role of the prime minister has been dealt with and like I said earlier, when a state government decides to go rogue, how does the Central Government respond to it? The Kalyan Singh government was running with the hare and hunting with the hounds; doing one thing and saying another not only to the Union Government but also to the National Integration Council and to the Supreme Court.

CNN-IBN: Surely, Narasimha Rao had intelligence inputs?

Manish Tewari: That is precisely what the Justice Liberhan Commission is saying; that there was a situation whereby an Intelligence failure was caused. The Central Government due to the promises of state government took the assurances at face value.

Ravi Shankar Prasad: Leave us aside, even a senior Congress leader like Arjun Singh publicly condemned Narasimha Rao's role. Was he ever called by the Commission to examine his role? You cannot pick a point or a fact here and another there. Justice Liberhan who is examining the entire issue came down with so much of heavy English condemnation of the BJP. The opening of the locks by Rajiv Gandhi and the shilanyas are important. If Justice Liberhan is examining the entire process, how could he miss this? It was incumbent on his part to examine the entire issue? PAGE_BREAK

CNN-IBN: Ravi Shankar Prasad are you disowning the Ram Janma Bhoomi movement? Are you blaming it on the opening of the gates of the Babri Masjid and the shilanyas during Rajiv Gandhi years?

Ravi Shankar Prasad: First of all, have your expressions corrected. Even the Supreme Court calls it a disputed structure and it is not the Babri Masjid. Secondly, did I ever say that we disown the Ram Janma Bhoomi movement? But the point is that we are discussing the report. Even Deen Dayal Upadhyaya and all the founders of Jana Sangh with their ideology have been named. Who is Justice Liberhan to influence my ideology? He says Hindus are not in favour of the movement. So much of movement was there in the entire country.

Too little, too late?

CNN-IBN: Is it too little too late? Seventeen years later what have we really achieved? Hasn't India moved beyond Ayodhya? Shouldn't we be looking at other important issues? Is that not where the Sangh Pariwar has lost out?

Ram Madhav: That has to be put to the Government as to why they decided to leak the report's findings and make it a big issue now when the issue is in the courts, the courts should have been allowed to settle the entire thing? Manish Tewariji is asking Ravi Shankar Prasadji if the BJP has given up the leadership of the movement between 1985 and 1990. I would like to ask them if they had taken up the leadership between the years 1986 and 1990 because they opened the locks, they performed the shilanyas. As for us, we would be very happy if they have taken up the responsibility?

CNN-IBN: It is not just important as to what happened on December 6 alone but what followed thereafter too. Hundreds of people died in riots after what happened in Ayodhya. Should the Congress's focus have been on prosecuting people instead of playing politics with the report?

Manish Tewari: By the analogy of too little too late, Adolf Eisenbach should never have been never brought from Uruguay and tried in 1960 for his role in the Holocaust. The sins of the BJP and the RSS are catching up with it.

CNN-IBN: Mr Tewari, nothing has happened. Hundreds of people died after December 6 and no one has been prosecuted. In that way the report is useless.

Manish Tewrai: Who created the atmosphere that led to the largest communal conflagration in the history of independent India? Is the BJP not responsible for this?

CNN-IBN: Has the BJP not moved to beyond Ayodya, Ravi Shankar Prasad? To reflect the aspirations of a new India, you cannot reflect the aspirations of the past? Has the BJP not realised that? Interestingly, your party has taken up issues like Madhu Koda. Has the BJP also realised that Babri Masjid is subject to the law of diminishing returns politically?

Ravi Shankar Prasad: I have told this to your channel and others before that this table was leaked because the UPA government was feeling the heat of Madhu Koda issue, that spectrum scam of Rs 20,000 crores, of price rises and the fiasco on sugarcane pricing as well as the 26/11 anniversary coming up. Let me tell you that the people of India do want the Ram temple at Ayodhya and that is a national will. But this whole business of it is coming about after 17 years. Let me leave you with a thought to ponder over. The present government messed up the Quattrocchi affair and it had to be withdrawn. Had we wished, while we were in power and I was the law minister of India, we too would have cancelled this whole Commission but did not as we believed in the propriety of law.

Manish Tewari: You did try your best but failed.

CNN-IBN: At the end of all this comes a report that resoundingly states the obvious. Rs 8 crore of the tax payers' money gone and 17 years later, no one really prosecuted for the violence that followed December. That perhaps is the tragedy with most commissions in this country. The more we live in the past, the less we will be ready to face the future.