Holy Work Destroys All Peace in India

The razing of a mosque ignites riots that pose the worst crisis since 1947

THEY CALLED IT KAR SEVA (HOLY WORK), BUT THE consequences were devilish. To the sounds of conch shells and clashing cymbals, a mob of Hindu fanatics wielding pickaxes, crowbars and bare hands descended upon the Babri mosque in the northern town of Ayodhya and razed it. Never mind that the Supreme Court of India, eager to preserve the nation as a secular state in which all religions are respected, had ordered that the mosque be left alone. The existence of the mosque, built by a nobleman of a Mughal Emperor in 1528 on the spot where the Hindu god Rama is...

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