Once in a while, human beings have to go on pilgrimage to a place pregnant with what to them is divine. That is why for a few thousand years, numerous Hindus trek to Ayodhyā to spend some time with the deified hero born there, Rāma. Being a modern person myself, I never felt called to visit sites associated with people I admire, not even within my own country. But then again, in my own life, Ayodhyā has played quite a role. When I started realizing the unusual nature of the controversy surrounding it, in 1989, I did visit it, but back then Rāma’s birthplace was still occupied by the Bābrī Masjid, a structure planted there as a mosque but used as a temple since 1949. I didn’t realize yet that I was going to play a modest role in the Ayodhyā affair, and even when the time came, I didn’t feel the urge to go there again. I thought I’d wait for the moment when proper temple architecture would adorn the site.

It’s almost that far, and I wouldn’t have to wait for long anymore. But then, it so happened that I was expected for some lectures at IIT Kānpūr, and a few days later for the same in BHU Vārānasī, so it was logical to bridge the gap with a visit to Ayodhyā, lying halfway. On November 1 and 2, (for Roman Catholics: All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day) of 2022 I visited Ayodhyā, the ancient capital city of its founder, the patriarch Manu Vaivasvata, and of the Solar Dynasty founded there by his son Ikṣvāku.

It is in this dynasty in around the 64^th generation after Manu according to the Puranic king-lists, that Rāma Dāśarathi was born. This is in the period of the Ṛg-Veda.
For comparison: king Bharata of the 43^rd generation, or 21 generations before Rāma, starts the Vedic tradition; and in the 92^nd generation Veda-Vyāsa as editor marks the end of the Ṛg-, Yajur– and Sāma-Veda; with Kṛṣṇa as a cousin of his Kaurava and Pāṇḍava grandsons, living 29 generations after Rāma. According to western Indological thought, the life of Rāma nearly coincides with the beginning of the conflict between the Vedic Paurava tribe and the proto-Iranian Ānava tribe, highlighted by the Battle of the Ten Kings and the subsequent Vārṣāgira Battle, when the Iranians were compelled to relocate to Afghanistan, whence they would expand as far as West Asia, Central Europe, and Mongolia.

But Rāma himself was not to figure in the Ṛg-Veda for reasons of simple geography. The book is based in the Sarasvatī basin (modern-day Haryāṇā), where a branch of the Lunar dynasty, founded by Purūravas, Ikṣvāku’s nephew through his elder sister Ilā, had settled. Its eastern horizon does not extend beyond the westernmost basin of the Gaṅgā, a few hundred miles west of Ayodhyā. The Vedic Paurava tribe was not wholly ignorant of the Solar Dynasty, and once they were helped in a war against the Druhyu tribe by the Solar king Māndhātā; but even he would only involve himself in this far-western conflict because his wife was a Paurava. Culturally, Indological scholars believe that Ayodhyā was more a part of the northeastern centre of Greater Magadha, the heartland of several non-Vedic traditions.

At very short notice, I was invited to give a lecture at the Awadh University, and the topic naturally was the scholarly debate on the Rāma Janmabhūmi, of which I had been a privileged witness years before these students were born, and soon also a participant. Indeed, now that most of the scholars concerned have left this world, I consider it a duty to bear witness before the new generation about this confrontation between on the one hand an ad hoc gathering of innocent scholars armed only with factual data but forced into this politically-charged battle, and on the other the activist Eminent Historians supported by an army of media hacks and international India-watchers.

On that campus, I was joined the next day by a Hindu friend from Guṛgaon/Gurugrām, Baijnath Aryan, who runs the museum for folk and tribal art founded by his father, the KC Aryan Lokādivāsikalā Museum. One of the collections he manages is the worldwide best series of artworks depicting Hanumān, hence he insisted on visiting the Hanumāngaṛhi and other temples dedicated to Hanumān.

Apart from these, we also paid our respects to Ṛṣabhadeva, the first Jain Tīrthaṅkara, in his birthplace temple. It is disputed whether he was a historical character, but if he was, he apparently belonged to the time of the early Ṛg-Veda, a few generations before Rāma. He is also named Ādināth, “earliest/original master”, with Nāth serving as a title conferred upon ascetics with great self-mastery. This includes for the last millennium the Nāth Yogi lineage that has developed Haṭha Yoga, of whom the best-known member is the present Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath.

Being a major capital city, it is no wonder that Ayodhyā attracted or brought forth many important people. Thus, five of the twenty-four Tīrthaṅkaras are said to have been born there, and the Buddhist philosophers Asaṅga and Vasubandhu lived there, as did the Buddha himself for a few years.

The Rāma birthplace temple was still under construction, so it was cordoned off and not yet open to the public. But we did manage to talk with Champat Rai, the overseer of the construction, after having accompanied him to the last half hour of a Rāma Kathā performance. Being more a reader of scripture than a listener to (let alone a performer of) scriptural recitations, I was taken aback by the austere beauty of this show.

What was really noteworthy in this visit was not so much this or that temple, but the dedication of the worshippers. There was a Parikrama going on, a walk of about 45 km around the sacred city. Some 300,000 devotees were participating. Their energy and good cheer were impressive and contagious. Enthusiasm etymologically means “being in God”, and that seems to have been their secret.

Another sign of devotion: in one street leading towards the Rāma Janmabhūmi, a series of houses each turned out to conceal a little temple inside. This is what Hindus used to do under Muslim rule: preserve as much as possible of their Dharmic tradition under adverse circumstances. It exemplifies what Sita Ram Goel said about Hindu society, both the institutional situation back then and the resulting psychology palpable till today: “Hindu society is an underground society.”

The same situation prevailed in Vārāṇasī (where we went on the 3^rd), in the Viśvanāth/Jñānvapi area: Hindu houses as close as possible to the Muslim-occupied Hindu sacred site concealed little temples. Unfortunately, though these makeshift temples may have survived centuries of Muslim rule, they proved powerless against the modernizing zeal of the BJP Government. And here, reform did not mean societal or faith-driven reform, only commercialization: the little temples were flattened to make way for a tourist-friendly plaza. The pilgrimage site was, according to the former owners and inhabitants of these temple-houses, redesigned to satisfy the wishes of the tourist industry, and to hell with the bravery of the earlier generations that had risked so much to safeguard the sanctity of the place.

This, then, is the new challenge to the guardians of Dharmic landscapes. The threat of Islamic temple destruction has become much less dramatic, at least in India, but it has made way for the threat of lukewarmness and irreligion. The devotional gems that earlier generations have bequeathed to the present one may fall prey to soulless secular exploitation. Let us see whether the zeal that was so conspicuous in the Rāma Janmabhūmi agitation of 1989-92 can still be translated into a similar zeal for worship, or if the need arises, for a similar agitation.