Babri report leak sets off political storm

The Babri storm swept through Parliament on Monday, setting the stage for a Congress-BJP faceoff that may prompt the Manmohan Singh government to advance the date for the tabling of the Liberhan Commission inquiry report on the Ayodhya demolition.

Prime minister Manmohan Singh is learnt to have spoken to finance minister Pranab Mukherjee from the US, after which a cabinet meeting was called on Tuesday morning.  The government, it is learnt, may decide to table the report in Parliament on Tuesday itself.

The report, parts of which were allegedly leaked to an English newspaper and a TV channel, says that the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992, was a meticulously planned conspiracy. While it indicted BJP leaders LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi among others, the surprise element was the reported criticism of former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. Liberhan, the newspaper claimed, says that Vajpayee could not have been unaware of what was going on at Ayodhya.

The inquiry report and the mandatory action-taken report (ATR) were expected to be placed in Parliament just before the winter session ends on December 22. But with the political temperature rising after a day of continuous disruptions in both houses, the government is considering a two-stage rollout. It may table the Liberhan report first and the ATR later after seeing how the issue plays out politically. The ATR, still under preparation, is what the BJP is awaiting anxiously as it will set the tone for the next round in the battle between the two national parties.

On Monday morning, when the newspaper published portions of the report’s findings, BJP accused the government of leaking it to the press instead of first presenting it to Parliament. The man in the eye of the storm, home minister P Chidambaram, denied the leak, but neither authenticated nor contradicted the contents of the article. However, a slightly different version of the Liberhan report findings surfaced on two television channels.

But the crux of the controversy is whether or not the Liberhan report indicts Vajpayee, Advani and Joshi.

One version of its findings says it does. The other version says the report points a finger at the senior leadership of the BJP but refrains from singling them out by name.
What seems to have shaken both the government and the BJP is the Vajpayee bombshell. Till now, the former PM was thought to be a marginal figure in the events leading to the demolition. According to BJP leader Arun Jaitley, Vajpayee was not even served a notice by the Liberhan Commission and former commission lawyer Anupam Gupta told DNA that in July, 2003, they had decided to leave him out of the inquiry because there was nothing to connect him to the Ayodhya movement. With Vajpayee unable to defend himself because of failing health, the issue has taken an unsavoury turn.

BJP leader Sushma Swaraj squarely blamed the government for ``leaking’’ the Liberhan findings to deflect attention from politically hot issues like the corruption scam around former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda. ``We had planned to raise the (Koda) matter today and several Congress leaders would have found it uncomfortable,’’ she said.

The Congress was not unduly worried. It feels that this may be a storm in a teacup and will die out soon. ``The issue is already settled politically and those who had to pay the price have already done so,’’ said a senior minister who did not want to be identified.
At the same time, realising the potency of an emotional issue, the government has decided to tread carefully. Sonia Gandhi met with senior minister Pranab Mukherjee, Chidambaram and AK Antony in the morning and again in the evening. A senior Congress leader said the government is in no hurry to complete the ATR although it may table the Liberhan report within a few days.