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NCM initiative `breaks the ice'

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JULY 15. The first initiative of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) to bring representatives of the Hindu and Muslim communities to the negotiating table here today ended with both sides claiming to have "broken the ice'' even as the very mention of the contentious Ram Mandir issue saw them revert to their stated positions.

Though no agenda had been fixed for the meeting with the NCM insisting that it was just a beginning and aimed at preparing the ground for addressing the key issues at a later stage, the Ram Mandir controversy was brought up by the VHP leader, Surendra Jain, at the fag end of the hour-and-a-half-long interaction. No sooner was it brought up, than the differences came to the fore.

While those present put their stamp of approval to the resolution drafted by the NCM, which articulated the need for a dialogue and acknowledged its efficacy in ironing out the rough spots, and called for a stop to hate campaigns, there was no sign of either side yielding on core issues.

Conceding that nothing much was achieved at the meeting, the NCM is drawing satisfaction from the fact that it managed to get the two sides to talk to each other.

Left to themselves, most of the representatives on both sides stuck to their positions with VHP's Praveen Togadia insisting that the first step ought to be taken by the Muslims by rehabilitating the Hindus in the Kashmir Valley, while the vice-president of the Muslim Personal Law Board (MPLB), Maulana Kalbe Sadiq, revealed that he had come to the meeting on the condition that the Ram Mandir issue would not be discussed.

While the elders on both sides were more accommodating in their response to today's meeting, with the eminent educationist, Maulana Wahiduddin Khan, the president of All India Organisation of Imams of Mosques, Moulana Jameel Ahmed Ilyasi, and Acharya Giriraj Kishore of the VHP stating that "we have broken the ice'', the young generation of leaders were more strident. Careful not to dismiss the initiative and refusing to say that the talks had failed, Mr. Togadia said: "We have an open mind and will respond in equal measure to the Muslims. If they accept our key demands vis-a-vis Kashmir, Ayodhya-Kashi-Mathura and cow slaughter, then we will bow before them; otherwise we will not even bend.''

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