The Babri Masjid Dispute: A Triumph of Fantasy over Reality

Words by Sandeep Radhakrishnan

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In the 1920s, travel posters, made for steamship lines and airlines, became extremely popular. The style changed notably in the 1920s, to focus attention on the product being advertised. The images became simpler, precise, more linear, more dynamic, and were often placed against a single color background. They conveyed a sense of power and safety – basically, what travellers were supposed to feel boarding liners and trains and visiting new destinations. (Available as print)

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The Babri Masjid Dispute: A Triumph of Fantasy over Reality

December 6, 1992.

The 22nd of January 2024 saw the culmination of a decades-long pursuit by the Hindu Right to construct a temple upon the former site of the Babri Masjid to mark the birthplace of Lord Ram, a major figure in Hindu mythology. The ‘prana prathistha’ (consecration ceremony) was, perhaps curiously, not performed by a high priest of the Hindu religion but rather by the Prime Minister himself. This peculiarity, however, would only appear to be as such to those unaware of the historical context of that disputed site in Ayodhya, for Narendra Modi being in the foreground of this event is in congruence with the lamentable course that history has taken in this story.