Before the verdict: How a Sufi shrine in Karnataka became ‘South India’s Ayodhya’

On October 17, the All India Akhara Parishad (AIAP), an organisation of Hindu seers, said it would launch a movement against the mosques adjoining the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi and Sri Krishna Janambhoomi in Mathura once the Ram Mandir was constructed, Deccan Herald reported. "Like the Babri Masjid, temples were also demolished at Kashi and Mathura to build mosques. The mosques must be demolished. Ram Temple, the Kashi and Mathura too are revered by the Hindus worldwide. They belong to us and we will take them," the publication quoted Mahant Narendragiri.

Even though political outfits of all hues, including the VHP and the RSS, have called for peace ahead of the Supreme Court Ram Janmabhoomi verdict, expected before November 17, these statements elicited a fresh concerns: Will the bruising Ayodhya legal battle be extended to more disputed sites?

Take the case of Baba Budangiri, a Sufi shrine located an hour’s drive away from Karnataka’s Chikamagalur, nestled in the picturesque Mullayangiri mountain ranges. The shrine was supposed to be a symbol of the shared heritage of Hindus and Muslims in the state—it is named after Hazrat Dada Hayat Meer Qalandar, who is believed to be the Hindu god Dattatreya himself. The shrine was a place of worship for believers from both the religions.

But, at the peak of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, saffron organisations like the VHP and RSS had demanded that the shrine be converted into a Hindu temple. In 2000, then Union minister Ananth Kumar vowed to make this shrine in Chikmagalur the equivalent of ‘South India’s Ayodhya’, The New Indian Express reported. The demand captured momentum, and soon snowballed into an electoral issue from which the Congress—then a powerful political force in the area—could never recover. The RSS organisations fought the case in the Supreme Court, which ordered for status quo to be maintained, but they have appealed again in the Karnataka High Court.

In December 2017, The NewsMinute reported that Chikmagalur BJP MLA C.T. Ravi visited the shrine, made inflammatory statements and proclaimed he was in possession of documents that proved this was a Hindu site. Minutes after his visit, devotees allegedly hoisted saffron flags at the site and destroyed some graves of the Sufi saint’s followers. This led to a confrontation between the communities and stones were pelted at vehicles that passed by. Since then, the Datta Teertha, which is held every December, and the annual Urus, held every March, came under heavy police protection.

When THE WEEK visited the site in April, Hindu women were entering the cave after respectfully covering their heads and Muslim saints served prasada water inside the cramped, slightly narrow confines of the shrine. “There were no issues until outsiders became involved,” says Mujeeb (name changed on request), a native of the area. “A few years back, unlike now, you did not even have to remove your slippers while going in. He was a man with a lot of followers because he cured diseases. I grew up with the stories that in Urus season [pilgrimage], a tiger would emerge from the cave,” he said.

Yogesh Raj, a VHP leader in Chikmagalur, had then brushed aside the question of whether Baba Budangiri as an electoral motif has fizzled away ahead of Lok Sabha elections 2019. “We are campaigning for Modi, not BJP, and all the things that Pakistan is doing,” he corrected me. Right now, he says, door-to-door campaigns have commenced. He leaves me with a rebuke: “It is Datta Peeth, don’t call it Baba Budangiri.”

Days ahead of the Ayodhya verdict, senior RSS and BJP leaders reached out to prominent Muslim clerics and intellectuals and held a meeting with them on Tuesday during which it was stressed that irrespective of the nature of the court ruling there should neither be 'junooni jashn' (excessive celeberation) nor 'haar ka hungama' (brouhaha over defeat).

The meeting, held at the residence of Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, was attended by RSS leaders Krishna Gopal and Ramlal, former Union minister Shahnawaz Hussain, Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind general secretary Mahmood Madani, Shia cleric Kalbe Jawad and filmmaker Muzaffar Ali.

"A historic dialogue was held today in which Muslim intellectuals and clerics participated. At the meeting, it was stressed that all efforts should be made to strengthen the unity and brotherhood in the country under all circumstances," Naqvi told reporters after the meeting.

"Kahin par bhi jeet ka junooni jashn aur haar ka hahakaari hungama nahin hona chahiye, usse bachna chahiye (Nowhere, the verdict should be excessively celebrated as a victory, nor there should be a brouhaha over the defeat. We should completely avoid this)," he said.

Hussain said it was unanimously agreed at the meeting that the Supreme Court verdict on Ayodhya will be acceptable to all.