December 23, 1949: Abdul Sees Divine Ram Lalla

Global history is replete with instances where faith has overshadowed all other considerations

- Balbir Punj

ON Friday December 23 1949, not too long after Independence, the Shri Rām Janmabhoomi dispute resurfaced when Rām Lallā idols mysteriously appeared in the Babri structure at Ayodhya in the dead of the night. That day was destined to become a starting point for a long drawn-out legal battle and a protracted public movement of unprecedented scale in the history of free India. Soon a small group of devotees chanting Prakat Kripala Deen Dayala arrived on the scene leading to commotion in the wee hours of the morning, a time when usually it was all quiet in Ayodhya particularly at the Babri structure.

For the believers the emergence of Rām Lallā was a divine phenomenon. A surprise statement by Abdul Barkat, a Muslim police constable on duty at the Police outpost at Rām Janmabhoomi on the night between 22 and 23 December 1949, made before a magistrate later further strengthened the devotees’ belief of the divinity of the episode that midnight. In Sri Ram Janma Bhumi: Historical and Legal Perspective, Justice Deoki Nandan has provided this version of Abdul Barkat’s testimony before a court,