“Ram Mandir Banaayenge !” “Ram Setu Bachchayenge !!”

Special Correspondent.

(With inputs from VSK Chennai)

HINDUS SERVE AN ULTIMATUM

RAMESWARAM, APRIL 18, 2007

“Ram Mandir…? Banaayenge !”  “Ram Setu …? Bachchayenge !!” That was the slogan which reverberated at the land’s end this afternoon. In the middle of the holiest pilgrim centre of Rameswaram, Shri. Ashok Singhal, International President of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, led the slogan and a huge assembly of a couple of thousands   demonstrators – 60 percent of them women – followed the chant, waving saffron flags. They had assembled there in response to the call of ‘Rameswaram Ram Setu Protection Movement’.

MAY 13 ALERT : THE ULTIMATUM

Shri. Singhal elctrified the atmosphere by declaring an ultimatum: In his special address to the demonstrators – in fact, to the whole of Bharat – he roared: “The Central government should leave Ram Setu untouched and come forward with an alternative alignment for the Sethusamudram Shipping Canal before May 13, 2007. If it fails to do so, a very big struggle will follow. On that day, Mahamandaleswars and heads of Akhadas will meet in Delhi to chalk out the further step. I have consulted them all in this regard. Members of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha must come out in support of this mighty struggle to protect Hind interests”.

Shri. Singhal asserted that Shri Hanuman himself protects Ram Janmasthan as proved by the fact that of the 19 bombs hurled by anti nationals on Ram Janmabhoomi, only one exploded, that too just destroyed the hand of the terrorist involved. He quizzed: ” So also, Ram Setu too is protected by Hanumanji. Otherwise, how does one explain dredgers, cranes and ships approaching Ram Setu break down one by one? (Latest: The engineer of a Russian ship working for Sethusamudram Project broke his hand and has been since hospitalized in Madurai. His condition is kept as a guarded secrect!). But Shri. Singhal was prompt in reminding the people that they will have to convey their anger to the Hon’ble President of Bharat and the Prime Minister through telegrams and letters (Midway during his speech, he asked those in the meeting who would write letters the very next day to raise their hands. All hands went up!)

He explained: “Ram Setu is the sole surviving solid proof that Shri. Ram lived in this land, that he came to Rameswaram and constructed the Setu. Western powers want to destroy the Setu just because of this. Their historians want to hide the fact from the people that Shri. Ram took birth thousands of years before Jesus Christ, as that would demolish their theory that Bharat did never have a long and glorious hisotry. It is not a coincidence that Sonia participated in the inuaguration of the Sethusamudram Project in its present form that seeks to destroy the Ram Setu and Ambika Soni declares that there is no Ram Setu at all”. (“It is due to the pressure from USA which made Sonia to inaugurate the Project to make the Palk Strait as international waters to help the American government.” Shri Singhal had told presspersons in Chennai on April 17).

The British taught us distorted history and never recognised Lord Ram as a historical figure and those who want to destroy the bridge are those against Shri. Ram, he said. Any desha bhakta will be angry for this, he concluded. The work on the Project be suspended immediately. VHP and the religious leaders are not against the Project per se;

Earlier in his address, Shri. Singhal reiterated quite a few aspects of Ram Setu protection, brought to the notice of people and the government in several hundreds of similar protest demonstrations from Punjab to Kerala through UP and Andhra – and, of course, in every district place of Tamilnadu all along past months.

· ‘If Ram Setu is demolished then it would destroy thorium, the fuel source for nuclear energy generation, large deposits running into tens of thousands of tons of which are found in the place. It can supply energy fotr the whole country for more than 100 years; it has to be saved for making Bharat a self-reliant nuclear power and as it is one of our top national imperatives

 .

·In addition to the NASA images, our own scientific evidences point to human activity in ancient times on both sides of Ram Setu as found by Dept. of Earth Sciences and ocean technologists of Bharat.

·The work on the project be suspended immediately. VHP the religious leaders are not against the Project per se; they were opposed to the present alignment that involved damaging the Ram Setu. There were five alternatives and the VHP and the Hindu Dharma Acharya Sabha wanted the Government to choose one of them.

The Rameswaram demonstration was held in the presence of Shri. R.V.S.Marimuthu ji  (Sanghchalak of Tamilnadu), RSS.

Blessing the people fighting for the protection of Ram Setu, Mahamandaleswar Swami Vishveshananda of Hardwar, sent out a warning that the family of anyone who destroys Ram Setu will face disaster.  

In Rama Janmabhoomi movement, Hindus were pitted against Muslim intransigence; but in saving Ram Setu, all fishermen – Muslims, Christians and Hindus – have come together, the Swami pointed out (It may be remembered that 140 associations of Rameswaram had joined the Ram Setu protection Movement).

Swami Paramatmananda of Rajkot Swami Paramatmananda, Secretary, Acharya Sabha made it clear that destruction of Ram Setu does not merely indicate economic or political loss. It means a cultural, religious destruction, he said. He called upon people to hit the streets as the government has become deaf to the demands of Hindus. Raise your voice if you want to be heard, he appealed.

He exposed the Shipping Minister T.R.Balu’s trickery in not giving an explanation to the Hindu leaders even after the lapse of three weeks after Prime Minister’s directive to that effect. The PM had asked Balu to respond to the delegation of religious leaders when they had met him in Delhi to demand protection of Ram Setu.

Highlighting the sentiments of the Hindu mind, Swami Abhimukhananda of Dwaraka said the Ram Setu is like the maang (the partitng of hair above the forehead) of Bharat Mata and destroying it would amount to making the Mother look like a widow. Shri. Ram appealed to Samudra Raja to no avail; only when Ram tried to take out his bow and arrow, work on the Setu could begin; like that, Hindu appeals have fallen on deaf ears. Struggle seems to be the only way, the Swami said.

Swami Sahaja Chaitanya spoke, also participated in the demonstration.Shri. Rama. Gopalan, founder, Hindu Munnani, pionted out that people should be ready to lay down even their lives in order to bring the powers that be, to their knees and thus save Ram Setu. He cited the Nandigram experience as precedence to this; there, the Marxist government backtracked from land acquisition only after people laid down their lives to realize their demand, he reminded.

Shri. S. Vedantam, international vice president of VHP, wanted the questionable background of Minister T.R.Baalu be brought to focus. He recalled how Balu had declared that he was ashamed of calling himself a Hindu – that too at a convention of Christians some months back. (The Minster has proved last week that he can be   repeatedly wayward: “There is no man made structure in the area where Sethusamudram Ship Channel Project (SSCP) works are going on”, said T R Baalu in Ramanathapuram on April 16 while speaking to reporters. There is no need for any change in the alignment of the project, he added). So, battle lines were drwan unmistakeably.

In his address, Shri R.S. Narayanaswami, journalist and vice president of VHP, Tamilnadu, traced history of the failure of the Canal Project for over a century.

Dr. Subramaniam Swamy of Janata Party referred to the ancientness of monuments. He said structures like Taj Mahal in Agra and Kutub Minar in Delhi were saved from the threat of damage and destruction from the modern development oriented initiatives due to public and judicial intervention. While the above two date back only to a few hundred years, the Ram Setu’s historical antiquity goes back to several millennia, he compared.

Shri. L. Ganesan, state BJP president, alleged that the persistence with the unwise alignment of Sethusamudram Canal is aimed at perpetuating vote bank and corruption (which he described as ‘note bank’). He said nobody has the authority to question belief systems like the honouring of a ‘hair of Mohamed Nabi’ in the Hazratbal mosque. Likewise, nobody can question the belief of Hindus – now scientifically proved – that Ram Setu was built by Shri Ram and so it is worship worthy.

Shri. Kuppuramu, advocate and Ramanathapuram Jilla Sanghchalak, RSS, presided over the demonstration. He is also the convenor of ‘RAMESWARAM RAMAR PAALAM PROTECTION MOVEMENT’, Chennai. The Movement’s website is being constantly updated with developments regarding protection of Ram Setu. Please visit the site at – www.saveramasetu.blogspot.com

As Shri Ashok Singhal hinted, the Movemnet seems all set to spread far and wide across the whole country soon, thanks to the the UPA apparatus out to antagonize Hindus in an unimaginative manner. The rulers are bound to encounter an organised bitter resistence of Hindus this time.