Babri demolition well-planned act of sabotage: Cobrapost sting

The demolition of Babri Masjid Dec 6, 1992 was not an act of "frenzied mobs" but that of "sabotage" planned by two Hindu outfits - separately but so much secretly that no government agency got wind of it, according to a sting operation by a news portal.

However the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) rubbished the report, terming it a conspiracy against the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha election.

"The conspiracy was hatched at the level of two Hindu outfits - the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Shiv Sena - but not jointly. Both these outfits had trained their cadres as part of an action plan, many months before it was implemented on Dec 6," news portal Cobrapost said Friday.

In an investigation, codenamed Operation Janmabhoomi, Cobrapost claims to establish beyond doubt that the demolition was not an act of frenzied mobs but an act of sabotage planned with so much secrecy that no government agency got wind of it.

The sting operation was carried out by a journalist with the news portal who interviewed 23 of the leaders at the forefront of Ram Janmabhoomi movement.

Among those who were interviewed were BJP leaders Uma Bharti, Kalyan Singh and Vinay Katiyar.

At a press conference in the capital, Cobrapost editor Anirudh Behl screened the recorded interviews in which some low-rung leaders of BJP, VHP and Shiv Sena have claimed that the operation was carried out with precision by their volunteers after going through intensive training and mock drills.

The sting claims that Bajrang Dal, the youth wing of VHP, had trained its cadres in Surkhej in Gujarat and the Shiv Sena in Bhind and Morena in Madhya Pradesh.

Rubbishing the report, senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi said: "There is no credibility in the undercover investigations done by Cobrapost. The CBI has not been able to produce any tangible evidence in 22 years."

Party leader Uma Bharati, who has been named in the sting operation, too dismissed the reports as a conspiracy against the party.

"I hold the Congress responsible for this," she said, while VHP secretary general Chanpat Rai said: "The publishing of the report is sponsored and with malafide intentions. It is designed at affecting the poll process and voters".

"We appeal to the Election Commission to take immediate action in the case," he said.

Asked about demands that the Election Commission stop the telecasting of the sting operation, Behl said, "We have not got any information from Election Commission regarding this."