Ayodhya verdict: Congress asks leaders to speak in one voice and stick to party’s official stance

india

Updated: Nov 09, 2019 10:01 IST

Congress leaders have been asked to refrain from making personal comments on the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid verdict and stick to party’s official position to be announced after the Supreme Court’s judgment in the 70-year old land title dispute on Saturday.

Congress general secretary in-charge of the organization, KC Venugopal, wrote to all office bearers and functionaries, asking them to not veer from the position espoused by the party’s top decision making body, the Congress Working Committee (CWC), on the Ayodhya issue.

“That will be the official version of the party and the same will be communicated to all the states,” Venugopal wrote and asked party leaders to desist from giving media bytes before party’s official stance is formulated.

CWC meet is being held at 10 Janpath, minutes before the Ayodhya judgment. CWC members, permanent invitees & special invitees are attending.

The Congress so far has maintained that it will accept the Supreme Court verdict on the sensitive issue.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had yesterday urged people to not see the Ayodhya verdict in terms of victory and defeat and instead use it to “further strengthen the great tradition of peace, unity and goodwill of India”.

He also thanked all sections of the society for working to create a harmonious and positive atmosphere in the run up to the important day.

The five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI), Ranjan Gogoi completed hearing the petition challenging Allahabad High Court’s September 30, 2010 order, that equally divided the disputed land in Ayodhya among Ram Lalla, Central Sunni Waqf Board, and Nirmohi Akhara, on October 16 and reserved its verdict in on one of the most sensitive and divisive disputes in modern India’s history.

The dispute is over ownership of 2.77 acres of land in Ayodhya, believed to be the birthplace of Lord Ram by the Hindus and the site of 400-year-old Babri Masjid by the Muslims. The mosque was razed by right-wing miscreants in 1992. Hindus have been trying to prove that the 16th-century Babri Masjid was built over a Ram temple that existed at the place where Lord Ram was born a thousands of centuries ago.