Tripura: Why RSS-backed Hindu group is staking claim on a mosque in Dimatoli
The Congress accused the BJP of creating communal disharmony in the state ever since it came to power in northeastern state five years ago
Disputes over ownership of religious sites have now transcended the cow belt to reach the northeast with an RSS-backed Hindu group staking claim over what is believed to be a mosque in South Tripura’s Dimatoli.
The Hindu Jagran Manch, a fringe group of the BJP’s ideological fountainhead Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), recently sparked a controversy claiming that the structure where the local Muslims offer prayers is an old Jagannath temple, prompting the police to seal the site to avert any communal flare up.
Handing over a picture of the dilapidated structure to Chief Minister Manik Saha, the Manch demanded his intervention to renovate what the outfit claimed was a temple.
There are 27 Muslim families at Chandrapur under Dimatoli gram panchayat where the structure is located. The locals have moved the district administration seeking restoration of their right to offer namaz at the site.
Symbol of communal harmony
The disputed spot is a place of religious importance for both Hindu and Muslim communities of the area. People from both communities used to visit the site to offer prayers.
As the place was a symbol of communal harmony in the state, the then Left Front government headed by Dasarath Debbarma on the first anniversary of the demolition of Babri Masjid chose the site as the venue for a “Sanghati Mela” (unity fair) to be held every year on December 6.
But after the BJP came to power in the state in 2018, the date of the fair was changed from December 6 to 10.
The saffron brigade further upped their ante this year claiming that the structure was a temple and started preventing people from offering namaz there, according to local residents.
‘Bid to create communal rift’
The Opposition parties CPI(M) and Congress took serious exception to the development saying it was an attempt to create a communal rift in the state by a section of people close to the BJP.
Stating that locals have been barred from offering namaz at the mosque, CPI (M) state secretary and central committee member Jitendra Chaudhury urged the chief minister to take action to restore the right of the Muslims of the area to offer prayers at the site. He also rubbished the claim that the structure was a temple. The claim was made just to create division in the society, said the CPI (M) leader.
Condemning the development, the state Congress demanded an in-depth study of the site by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to settle the dispute. Tripura Pradesh Congress president Asish Kumar Saha accused the BJP of creating communal disharmony in the state ever since it came to power five years ago.
The northeastern state that has an 8.6 per cent Muslim population (as per the 2011 census) experienced communal violence when Hindu groups attacked a mosque and properties of people from the minority community in November 2021.
The controversy over the religious site in Tripura resonates with the current temple-mosque disputes in Uttar Pradesh’s Mathura and Varanasi. A similar dispute led to the demolition of the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya in UP on December 6, 1992.
Hindu groups claim that the Shahi Idgah mosque complex in Mathura was built on the Krishna Janmasthan, the birthplace of Lord Krishna, and the Gyanvapi Mosque in Varanasi was originally a Kashi Vishwanath temple dedicated to Lord Shiva.
In another sensitive development in Tripura, Janajati Suraksha Mancha, another RSS-backed organisation has decided to hold a tribal rally at the state capital Agartala on Christmas (December 25) to demand delisting converted tribals from the Scheduled Tribe (ST) list. The prime target of the group is the tribals who got converted to Christianity.
