A court in India has decided to turn the site of a 16th century mosque into a Hindu temple. In fact, the conversion of the space into a temple will begin with a ceremony attended by the Prime Minister of India.
The government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is accused of discriminatory policies against Muslims. According to Indian media, the Supreme Court of Uttar Pradesh province last November ruled in favour of Hindus in the dispute over Babri Mosque.
Modi will lay the foundation stone for the construction of a 161-foot-high temple located in Ayodhya.
The date set for this conversion is August 5.
Although Muslims built the mosque in 1528 by general Mir Baqi, Hindu's believe that the site is the birthplace of Rama, a major Hindu deity, and that Muslims destroyed a temple that already existed there.
On December 6, 1992, radical Hindus belonging to Vishva Hindu Parishad destroyed the mosque. In 2003, excavations over the former mosque found a shrine over a thousand years old and human activity had existed on the site for thousands of years.
Regarding the mosque, the court decided to give it to Hindus to build a temple, but in return they had to grant an area of 5 acres for Muslims to construct a mosque.
The excavations by the Archaeological Survey of India was used as evidence in the court case to prove that a Hindu structure existed on the site before the mosque.
According to the local press on August 5, Modi will place a silver brick weighing 40 kilos. Rituals will also be performed with holy water from the Ganges river and with sacred soils from 4 Hindu burial monuments.
