Muslims in the north Indian town of Ayodhya are terrified as Hindu extremists prepare to build a temple to their god Lord Ram today, on the site of a 16th-century mosque they demolished a decade ago.
A local Muslim leader, Mr Mohammed Ansari, said: "Nobody is looking at our concerns and no police officer has visited us to inquire about our safety. They [the Hindus] want to turn Ayodhya into another Gujarat."
Mr Ansari was referring to sectarian rioting in Gujarat state earlier this month in which more than 600 people, mainly Muslims, were slaughtered by Hindu mobs and tens of thousands made homeless.
The pogrom followed the burning by a Muslim mob of a trainload of 58 Hindu activists who were returning from Ayodhya, where the World Hindu Council is leading the 10-year campaign to build a temple on the site of the razed mosque, believing it to be Ram's birthplace.
The Muslim quarter in this predominantly Hindu city of 6,000 temples in Uttar Pradesh state, 450 miles east of New Delhi, is deserted.
Most of the 5,000 residents have fled their homes, anticipating trouble after Hindu leaders insisted they would go ahead with their religious ceremony today, despite a Supreme Court ban.
Ayodhya's poverty-ridden Muslims are haunted by memories of marauding mobs attacking their homes in 1992 when Hindu zealots demolished the Babri mosque nearby. This led to weeks of countrywide rioting in which more than 2,000 people, mainly Muslims, died.
Muslims comprise 12 per cent of India's population of one billion, while Hindus form 85 per cent.
"The Gujarat killings have led to most of us sending our women and children to safety," a tailor, Mr Nanhe Munin, said. "We are Indians too, but the Hindus want to drive us out. There is nowhere else we can go."
Mr Ansari said: "The Hindus do not allow us to bury our dead or worship in our mosques. It's majority rule that we live under." Ayodhya has 36 mosques and 80 graveyards. Muslims are also apprehensive about the deployment of the predominantly-Hindu provincial police that has a history of supporting its own community mobs during communal unrest. A judicial commission indicted the constabulary for its "partisan" role during sectarian rioting in the state in the late 1980s.
