Ram Mandir

Ram Mandir
The Ram Mandir is a Hindu temple that is under construction in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh, India. It is located at the site of Ram Janmabhoomi, the hypothesized birthplace of Rama, a principal deity of Hinduism. The site is the former location of the Babri Masjid.
The temple construction is being supervised by the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra trust. The ground-breaking ceremony was performed on the 5th of August 2020, by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
History
Background
Rama, an incarnation of god Vishnu, is a widely worshiped Hindu deity. According to the ancient Indian epic, Ramayana, Rama was born in Ayodhya. In the 16th century, the Mughals constructed a mosque, the Babri Masjid, which is believed to be the site of the Ram Janmabhoomi, the birthplace of Rama. A violent dispute arose in the 1850s over this site between Hindus and Muslims.
In the 1980s, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), belonging to the Hindu nationalist family Sangh Parivar, launched a new movement to reclaim the site for Hindus and to erect a temple dedicated to the infant Rama (Ram Lalla) at this spot. In November of 1989, the VHP laid the foundations of a temple on land adjacent to the disputed mosque. On the 6th of December 1992, the VHP and the Bharatiya Janata Party organised a rally at the site involving 150,000 volunteers, known as kar sevaks. The rally turned violent, and the crowd overwhelmed the security forces and tore down the mosque.
The demolition resulted in several months of intercommunal rioting between India's Hindu and Muslim communities, causing the death of at least 2,000 people, and triggering riots all over the Indian subcontinent. A day after the demolition of the mosque, on the 7th of December 1992, The New York Times reported that over 30 Hindu temples across Pakistan were attacked, some set on fire, and one was demolished. Hindu temples in Bangladesh were also attacked. The government of Pakistan closed schools and offices in a day of protest. As of 2020, some of these Hindu temples that were partially destroyed during the retaliation of Babri Masjid are still in a state of disrepair.
On the 5th of July 2005, five terrorists attacked the makeshift Ram temple at the site of destroyed Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India. All five were shot dead in the ensuing gunfight with the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), while one civilian died in the grenade attack that the attackers launched to breach the cordoned wall. The CRPF suffered three casualties, two of whom were seriously injured with multiple gunshot wounds.
A 1978 and 2003 archaeological excavation by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) found evidence indicating that Hindu temple remains had existed on the site. Archaeologist KK Muhammad accused several historians of undermining the findings. Over the years, various title and legal disputes also took place, such as the passage of the Acquisition of Certain Area at Ayodhya Ordinance in 1993. It was only after the 2019 Supreme Court verdict on the Ayodhya dispute that it was decided the disputed land be handed over to a trust formed by the Indian government, for the construction of a Ram temple. The trust was eventually formed under the name of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra. Five acres of land was allocated for a new mosque 22 km away in the city in Dhannipur village. On the 5th of February 2020, it was announced in the Parliament of India that the Modi government had accepted a plan to construct the temple.
Prior construction efforts
In the 1980s, the VHP began to collect funds and bricks with "Jai Shree Ram" written on them. Later, the Rajiv Gandhi government gave the VHP permission for to proceed, with the then-Home Minister Buta Singh formally conveying the permission to the VHP leader Ashok Singhal. Initially, the federal and state governments had agreed that the would be conducted outside of the disputed site. However, on the 9th of November 1989, a group of VHP leaders and Sadhus laid the foundation stone by digging a pit adjacent to the disputed land. The of the sanctum was constructed there.
Deity
Ram Lalla Virajman, the infant form of Rama, an avatar of Vishnu, is the presiding deity of the temple. Ram Lalla's dress was stitched by tailors Bhagwat Prasad and Shankar Lal, a fourth generation tailor to Rama's idol.
Ram Lalla was a litigant in the court case over the disputed site in 1989, being considered a "juristic person" by the law. He was represented by Triloki Nath Pandey, a senior VHP leader who was considered as Ram Lalla's closest 'human' friend.
According to the temple trust, the final blueprint includes temples dedicated to Surya, Ganesha, Shiva, Durga, Vishnu and Brahma in the temple grounds.
Architecture
The original design for the Ram temple was devised in 1988 by the Sompura family of Ahmedabad. The Sompuras have contributed to the design of over 100 temples worldwide for at least 15 generations, including the Somnath temple. The chief architect of the temple was Chandrakant Sompura, and he was assisted by his two sons Nikhil Sompura and Ashish Sompura, who are also architects.
A new design, with some changes from the original, was prepared by the Sompuras in 2020, in accordance with the Hindu texts the vastu shastra and the Shilpa Shastras. The temple will be wide, long and high, and once complete, the temple complex will be the world's third largest Hindu shrine. It is designed in the Gujara-Chaulukya style of Northern Indian temple architecture. A model of the proposed temple was showcased during the Prayag Kumbh Mela in 2019.
The main structure of the temple will be built on a raised platform and will have three storeys. It will have five mandapas in the middle of the garbhagriha (sanctum sanctorum) and on the entryway. Three mandapas on one side shall be of Kudu, Nritya, and Rang, and the two mandapas on the other side will be of Kirtan and Prarthana. In Nagara style, the mandapas are to be decorated with shikhara. The tallest Shikhara will be above the Garbhagriha.
The building will have a total of 366 columns. The columns will have 16 idols each to include the incarnations of Shiva, the 10 Dashavataras, the 64 Chausath Yoginis, and the 12 incarnations of the goddess Saraswati. The width of the stairs will be . In accordance with scriptures dedicated to the design of temples dedicated to Vishnu, the sanctum sanctorum will be octagonal. The temple will be built in , and of land will be developed into a complex with a prayer hall, a lecture hall, an educational facility and other facilities including a museum and a cafeteria.
Construction
The Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra trust began the first phase of construction of the Ram Temple in March of 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in India caused a temporary suspension of the construction. On the 25th of March 2020, Ram's idol was moved to a temporary location in the presence of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. In preparation for the temple's construction, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad organised a ' ', in which individuals would gather at different places to chant the Vijay Mahamantra – , on the 6th of April 2020. This was said to ensure "victory over hurdles" in the construction of the temple.
Larsen & Toubro offered to oversee the design and construction of the temple free of cost and became the contractor of the project. The Central Building Research Institute, National Geophysical Research Institute and the Bombay, Guwahati and Madras Indian Institutes of Technology are assisting in areas such as soil testing, concrete and design.
The construction work will be accomplished with 600 thousand cubic feet of sandstone from Bansi pahadpur village mountain in Rajasthan. In the 1990s, more than two hundred thousand bricks etched with the 'Sri Rama' in several languages had arrived from various parts of the country to be used in the foundation. There will be no use of iron in the construction of the temple, and the fusing of the stone blocks will require ten thousand copper plates.
Bhoomi Poojan ceremony
The temple construction officially started again after a Bhumi pujan ceremony on the 5th of August 2020. Three-day long Vedic rituals were held ahead of the ground-breaking ceremony, which revolved around the installation of a silver brick as the foundation stone by the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi. On the 4th of August, the was performed, in order to invite all the major deities into the temple.
On the occasion of the , soil and holy water were collected from several religious places across India, such as the Triveni Sangam of the rivers Ganga, Yamuna, and Saraswati at Prayagraj, as well as the Kaveri river at Talakaveri, and the Kamakhya Temple in Assam. Soil was also sent from various Hindu temples, Gurudwaras and Jain Temples across the nation to bless the temple. Soil was also sent from the four pilgrimage locations of Char Dham.
On 5 August, Prime Minister Modi offered prayers at Hanumangarhi to seek blessings of Hanuman for the day's events.The ground breaking and foundation stone laying ceremony of Ram Mandir took place following this. Yogi Adityanath, Mohan Bhagwat, Nritya Gopal Das and Narendra Modi gave speeches. Modi started his speech with Jai Siya Ram, and he went on to urge those in attendance to also chant Jai Siya Ram.
Reactions to the ceremony
Some priests and religious leaders complained that the ceremony did not follow proper ritual procedures. They also stated that the 5th of August was not a ritually auspicious date and that the function did not include a havan. In this respect, writer Arundhati Roy, a noted critic of Modi, pointed out that the chosen date marked one year since the revocation of the special status of Jammu and Kashmir." Pakistan made an official statement through its Pakistan Foreign Office criticising India for commencing construction of the temple, due to the history of the site. The Times of India also reported that after the ground-breaking ceremony at Ram Mandir, Pakistani Hindus feared violence in the same way as what happened in 1992.
Various Indian political leaders praised the ground-breaking ceremony.
2021present
In August of 2021, a viewing location was created for the public to watch the construction. Following the ground-breaking ceremony, up to of debris were removed and the remaining earth compacted. The foundation was made using roller-compacted concrete. A total of 47-48 layers, each layer one feet high, were completed by mid-September of 2021. Due to electricity supply issues in Mirzapur, the cutting of the sandstone was slowed down. At the beginning of 2022, a video was released by the temple trust, showing the planned construction of the temple in 3D along with other related information.
In January of 2023, two 60 million-years-old Shaligram rocks, 26 tonnes and 14 tonnes respectively, were sent from the Gandaki river in Nepal. These rocks were used to carve the idol of Ram Lalla in the sanctum sanctorum.
, according to the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, 70% of the groundwork had been completed and 40% of the roof work had been completed.
Donations
The temple trust decided to launch a nationwide "mass contact and contribution campaign" aimed at reaching 55-600 million people. Voluntary donations of and higher were accepted. On the 15th of January 2021, President of India Ram Nath Kovind made the first contribution towards the construction of the Ram Mandir by donating . This was followed by several leaders and notable personalities across the nation. By April of 2021, around was collected from donations across India. Nearly 150,000 VHP activists participated in collecting donations. The temple trust not only received donations from Hindu devotees, but also from several members of Christian and Muslim communities.
A few individuals including former Karnataka Chief Ministers HD Kumaraswamy and Siddaramaiah strongly questioned the way in which the funds were collected. After failing to raise , the headmistress of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh school experienced bullying, and was subsequently suspended. A similar case occurred in Ballia district. Following allegations of corruption, Tata Consultancy Services was brought in to digitise the accounts.
In popular culture
During the 2021 Delhi Republic Day parade on Rajpath, Uttar Pradesh's tableau showcased a replica of the Ram Mandir. Small replicas of the temple design were displayed during Diwali in 2021.
Slogans
is an expression in Hindi, and has become one of the most popular slogans in relation to the Ram Janmabhoomi movement and Ram Mandir. It has been used as early as 1985–86, was popularised in the 1990s, and has a number of variations.
It has been a symbol of hope and it has become a part of festivities, and has also become a part of stand-up comedy, jokes and memes. In 2019, the slogan was used in the Parliament of India, and it has also been used by media houses. The slogan has been used as a threat as well as a vow.
There are variations of the slogan such as one used by Lal Krishna Advani: "". Other variations and adaptations include "", "", "" and "".
Books and films
In 2020, Kangana Ranaut announced plans to direct a film about the Ayodhya dispute titled Aparajitha Ayodhya, with V. Vijayendra Prasad as the writer. The film would also feature the Bhoomi Pujan.
In October of 2021, politician Salman Khurshid of the Congress Party published a book entitled Sunrise over Ayodhya: Nationhood in Our Times, which was about the decline of secularism in India over the construction of the Ram Mandir at Ayodhya. The book became controversial among members of the BJP, because one of its chapters compared Hindutva to Islamic terrorism.
See also
Ram Rath Yatra
List of Hindu temples in India
Conversion of non-Islamic places of worship into mosques
Conversion of mosques into non-Islamic places of worship
Notes
References
External links
Ayodhya dispute
Hindu temples in Uttar Pradesh
Proposed religious places
Rama temples
21st-century Hindu temples
Buildings and structures in Ayodhya