LUCKNOW, India, 6 July 2005 — Six heavily armed men yesterday stormed a shrine at the heart of a bitter Hindu-Muslim dispute in Ayodhya, northern India. Security forces killed five of them in a gunbattle. Police identified the body of the sixth man as the suicide bomber who set off explosives strapped to his body. The resulting explosion blew up part of the wall surrounding the structure, enabling his comrades to enter the shrine.
Jyoti Sinha, chief of the Central Reserve Police Force guarding the shrine, said the militants hired a Marshall jeep from the Faizabad railway station for a “pilgrimage” to Ayodhya. The driver of the jeep — identified as Rehan, a resident of Ayodhya — has been arrested, Sinha said.
While hiring Rehan, the militants told him that they wanted a “quick pilgrimage.” “They hired my vehicle at a petrol pump. One of them came to me and did the talking, after which they put their stuff in the vehicle,” Rehan said. He was told that they wanted to have a “darshan” at the makeshift temple there, following which they wanted to be taken back to Faizabad.
“They took the route along the Rajghat, close to the Saryu River. Where the road ends at Nirmochan Ghat, there is a small temple, where they knelt before the deity and prayed,” Rehan said. From there, the jeep was reversed and taken to the disputed shrine.
The attack was launched at around nine in the morning. In the two-hour gunbattle between the security forces and the militants the five militants were killed while three policemen were wounded, Sinha added.
In 1992, Hindu fanatics demolished the 16th century Babri Mosque on the sprawling 80-acre complex, sparking religious riots that killed more than 2,000 people, mostly Muslims.
Hindu leaders claim the mosque was built by Mogul Emperor Babur on the site of a Hindu temple. Muslims say there is no proof of that claim. The dispute is still working its way through India’s courts.
Police seized four AK-47 assault rifles, one carbine rifle, 17 live grenades and one small rocket launcher from the attackers, N. B. Singh, deputy inspector general of police, told reporters.
Hard-line Hindus who destroyed the mosque in 1992 condemned the attack. The Bharatiya Janata Party called for a nationwide protest today.
No group claimed responsibility but the right-wing Shiv Sena party blamed the raid on Islamic militant groups it said were supported by neighboring Pakistan. Activists from the party burned a Pakistani flag in India’s financial hub Bombay.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh appealed for calm.
“It is fortunate that the attack was foiled and the attackers were killed during the shootout,” he said in a statement. “It is also fortunate that no damage occurred to the physical structures at the site of the incident.”
Home Ministry officials said they had general information that important facilities and religious sites around the country could be targeted and states had been alerted about it.
“Obviously it was a militant group which launched the ghastly attack... their identity is being established. Our information is they were not residents of Ayodhya,” Home Secretary V.K. Duggal told a news conference.
“It’s not a symbolic attack but a very serious attack,” said BJP chief Lal Krishna Advani, who led the campaign for the destruction of the Babri Mosque in the early 1990s. “The reaction to this attack should be proportionate.”
Pakistan condemned the attack. “Pakistan is against terrorism in all its forms,” a Foreign Ministry spokesman said. Hizbul Mujahideen, a militant group fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, said Hindu groups orchestrated the attack.
