India PM inaugurates controversial temple while eyeing upcoming elections

Published

1 year ago

January 22, 2024

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A 19th-century dispute, which has gone through decades of court procedures, has finally culminated in the Ram Temple.

Consecrated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, this temple site is believed to be the birthplace of Lord Ram, one of the most revered gods in the Hindu pantheon.

The city of Ayodhya in India’s most populous state Uttar Pradesh is all decked up.

Saffron flags, cut-outs of Lord Ram, strings of marigold flowers, decorative lights shaped in Hindu symbols and new paintwork have transformed this sleepy, little rundown town.

Large LED screens display the consecration across the country, while Indian embassies carry it across the world and even on a sponsored screen at Times Square in New York.

Namit Khanna, who has come from Singapore to witness the ceremony, tells Sky News “It’s a civilisation moment that I feel for all of us in India, and it has been a struggle of so many years of our ancestors.”

Rishab Kaushal says: “This is like a different world, the 500-year gap has been completed. We are all so happy. We’ve been given a new festival… Today we’ve been given our Lord.”

Holding her 7-month-old baby, Preeti says: “Our forefathers had died waiting for such a moment. And today we are so happy. And we wish to thank Modi for this, that we can see the temple constructed in our lifetime.”

Mr Modi is omnipresent. His presence in the temple town cannot be missed and everyone credits him with the construction of the Ram Temple.

While only 8,000 people have been officially invited over 100,000 have converged on the city including Bollywood royalty, industrialists, cultural icons, sportspersons, and diplomats.

According to the Temple Trust, donations have exceeded over 4trn rupees (£38bn), pouring in from far and wide.

Conspicuous of their absence are opposition party leaders who have called the inauguration a political project by Mr Modi and his ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. They will stay away from today’s programme and come another day.

A number of senior Hindu priests and heads of four major shrines, the Shankaracharyas, have also refused to attend on the grounds that consecrating an unfinished temple undermines scripture.

For years the construction of the temple has been one of the most controversial and contentious issues in modern India.

Both Hindus and Muslims have laid claim to the 2.77-acre plot – the size of a football field – on which stood the Babri Mosque since the 16th century. Hindus believe that the Mughal Emperor Babur destroyed an original Ram temple and built the Babri mosque on the exact same spot in 1528.

In 1949, idols of Lord Ram were found in the central dome of the mosque and a large number of Hindus began to pray there. This led to protests by Muslims and the government locked the gates of the mosque, declaring it a disputed site.

In the 1980s, right-wing Hindu organisations and the BJP seized on the Ram Janam Bhoomi Ayodhya movement as a sort of Hindu renaissance. A promise to retake the land and rebuild the temple propelled them into centre stage of national politics.

On 6 December 1992, the Babri mosque was destroyed by thousands of right-wing volunteers who called themselves ‘Kar Sevaks’. The events triggered religious riots across the country in which about 2,000 people, most of them Muslim, were killed.

Subsequently, the site was heavily protected and a series of ongoing court cases by various groups were fought for ownership.

On 9 November 2019 in a unanimous verdict by a five-judge bench, the Supreme Court of India awarded the disputed site to the Hindus, rejecting the Muslims’ claim.

The court said “Archaeological evidence supports an underlying structure of Hindu origin. The Muslim parties failed to establish exclusive possession of the disputed land.”

The court directed the government to give an alternate piece of land to the Muslims, about 25km away in a village called Dhannipur.

Except for a broken razorwire fence, there are no signs of construction at this site.

Sitting on a charpoy on the vacant land, 72-year-old Mohammad Islam tells Sky News: “Look, it was wrong, but we have to live within the confines of the constitution. We have to adhere to it when a decision is right or when it’s not right. But we have to move on for development, let’s leave behind issues of temples and mosques now.”

Shahbaz Khan, a 33-year-old welder says: “Modi is the prime minister of the country, not just one community. We have no issues about the temple, we are happy. But there must be development for us too. The ruling BJP motto is ‘development for one and all’, but we see development is just for one.”

The Ayodhya issue has polarised the country for decades and the rift between the majority Hindus with their 182 million Muslim brethren has widened.

Hinduism is almost 4,000 years old and is the religion of almost 80% of the population. The first Islamic dynasty was established in the 13th century and Muslims constitute around 14% of the population.

Since Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party has been in power since 2014 there has been a deepening of social divide and a display of muscular Hindu nationalism that has contributed to religious tensions.

Restrictions on the slaughter and sale of cows (revered by Hindus) have led to vigilantism and the killing of a number of Muslim traders transporting cattle.

Today’s ceremony will be seen as a political victory for Mr Modi and his party and will further consolidate his popularity with the majority.

It will also help him garner more votes for the upcoming general elections due in the summer, which he is widely believed to win.

One hopes that now with the construction of the Ram Temple the country’s deepening religious fissures and animosity between the two communities finally ends.

World

Trump ‘very disappointed’ in Russian strikes on Ukraine and calls for Putin to ‘sit down and sign a deal’

Published

40 mins ago

April 28, 2025

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Trump 'very disappointed' in Russian strikes on Ukraine and calls for Putin to 'sit down and sign a deal'

Donald Trump has said he’s “very disappointed” with Russia as he continues to push for a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine.

On Saturday, the US president met with Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the Vatican for their first face-to-face meeting since their explosive White House summit.

The Ukrainian president said the meeting ahead of Pope Francis’s funeral could end up being “historic.” Hours later, Mr Trump questioned Vladimir Putin’s appetite for peace in a Truth Social post.

Speaking before boarding Air Force One on Sunday, Mr Trump again said the meeting went well, and that the Ukrainian leader was “calmer”.

“I think he understands the picture, I think he wants to make a deal,” he said, before turning to Mr Putin and Russia.

“I want him to stop shooting, sit down and sign a deal,” the US president said, adding he was “very disappointed that they did the bombing of those places (including Kyiv, where nine people were killed in a Russian airstrike on Friday) after discussions”.

However, Mr Trump said he thinks Mr Zelenskyy is ready to give up Crimea, which the Ukrainian leader has repeatedly said he would refuse to do.

He added that “we’ll see what happens in the next few days” and said “don’t talk to me about Crimea, talk to Obama and Biden about Crimea”.

Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, while Barack Obama was president.

Meanwhile, US secretary of state Marco Rubio told Sky’s US partner network NBC News that a peace deal to end the war was “closer in general than they’ve been any time in the last three years, but it’s still not there”.

“If this was an easy war to end, it would have been ended by someone else a long time ago,” he added on the Meet the Press show.

It comes after North Korea confirmed it had deployed troops to fight for Russia, months after Ukraine and Western officials said its forces were in Europe.

State media outlet KCNA reported North Korean soldiers made an “important contribution” to expelling Ukrainian forces from Russian territory, likely to be the Kursk region.

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KCNA said leader Kim Jong Un made the decision to deploy troops to Russia and notified Moscow, and quoted him as saying: “They who fought for justice are all heroes and representatives of the honour of the motherland.”

It also quoted the country’s ruling Workers’ Party as saying the end of the battle to liberate Kursk showed the “highest strategic level of the firm militant friendship” between North Korea and Russia.

Last June, Mr Kim and Mr Putin signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty after a state visit – his first to the country in 24 years.

The North Korean leader promised at the time “full support and solidarity to the Russian government, army and people in carrying out the special military operation in Ukraine”.

World

40 killed in blast at Iran’s biggest port as Tehran denies explosion ‘linked to fuel for missiles’

Published

40 mins ago

April 28, 2025

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40 killed in blast at Iran's biggest port as Tehran denies explosion 'linked to fuel for missiles'

At least 40 people have been killed and several hundred more injured after an explosion and fire at Iran’s largest port, according to state media.

The blast, at the Shahid Rajaei container hub near the southern city of Bandar Abbas, happened on Saturday as Iran held a third round of talks with the US in Oman about Tehran’s nuclear programme.

Shipping containers burned, goods inside were badly damaged and the explosion was so powerful that windows several miles away were shattered, reports said.

Helicopters and aircraft dumped water from the air on the blaze and by Sunday afternoon it was 90% extinguished, the head of Iran’s Red Crescent Society told state media.

Officials said port activities had resumed in unaffected parts of Shahid Rajaei.

Out of the 752 people who had received treatment for their injuries, 190 were still being treated in medical centres on Sunday, according to Iran’s crisis management organisation.

Chemicals at the port were suspected to have worsened the blast, but the exact cause of the explosion was not clear.

Iran’s defence ministry denied international media reports that the explosion may be connected to the mishandling of solid fuel used for missiles.

The reports were “aligned with enemy psyops [psychological operations]”, according to a ministry spokesperson, who told state TV the blast-hit area did not contain any military cargo.

According to the Associated Press, British security company Ambrey said that the port in March received sodium perchlorate, which is used to propel ballistic missiles and the mishandling of which could have led to the explosion.

The Financial Times previously reported two Iranian vessels had shipped from China enough of the ingredient to propel up to 260 mid-range missiles.

It was reportedly to help Tehran replenish stocks after its missile attacks on Israel in 2024.

Iran’s military has sought to deny the delivery of sodium perchlorate from China.

Iran’s state-run Irna news agency reported on Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin deployed several emergency aircraft to Bandar Abbas to provide help.

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Pilgrims travel to Pope Francis’s tomb to remember the late pontiff

Published

40 mins ago

April 28, 2025

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Pilgrims travel to Pope Francis's tomb to remember the late pontiff

Anna and Irene have already been queuing for an hour or so, and they know they have a long wait still to come.

“Two hours, three hours, ten hours – what does it matter?” says Irena. “This is about eternity.”

They have come to Rome from Slovenia, Catholics who felt “Papa Francis would have wanted us to be here”.

And under the sun outside Santa Maria Maggiore, they are awaiting the opportunity to visit his tomb.

Francis, says Irena, “was like a rainbow” who lit up the world. Anna nods along: “We are so happy to be here.”

The Pope’s tomb has become a new source of pilgrimage.

More than 30,000 people came to view it during the first morning after the Pope’s funeral, the queue snaking from the front of the mighty basilica and then up and down across the square at the back.

Some were curious visitors, others were devout followers – priests and nuns mixing in the queue with tourists and devoted locals.

All of these admired Francis; a very few actually knew him.

Father Alessandro Masseroni is a deacon who came to Rome to train to become a priest. On his phone, he shows me a photo of him and Francis, with the Pope offering words of encouragement.

He says: “I had the honour to serve Pope Francis and to talk to him many times and it was a special experience. I understand why he was so loved by all the people – he was simple and direct.

“He was sunny. St Francis was his role model and when I saw the first picture of the Pope’s tomb, the first thing I thought was of the tomb of St Francis of Assisi.

“Pope Francis will leave a legacy – it doesn’t end with his death but will continue.”

What are your emotions now, as you wait to visit his tomb, I ask. Father Alessandro pauses and smiles.

“Many emotions of course, but mainly, I think… thankfulness.”

That has been a recurring aspect among so many of the people we have met in Rome over the past week – the sense that sadness for Francis’s death is outweighed by the sense that his was a life that should be celebrated.

Volodymyr Borysyak flew in from London on the morning of the Pope’s funeral to make his third pilgrimage to Rome.

Barely had he arrived than his phone was stolen, a crime he responded to by praying for the thief.

Volodymyr is a refugee from western Ukraine who worries that his home country’s plight is being forgotten by some of the world.

Now, the Pope who inspired him has died.

You might imagine that he would be resentful and angry. Instead, he is full of smiles.

“We are happy to be the pilgrims of the world and this is a special day,” he tells me. “I know the pope used to pray in this basilica so that is why we will stay so long here to visit Santa Maria Maggiore.

“I think Pope Francis was, is and will be the pope for the world, because of the mercy of his heart and his love for everybody.”