New Delhi, Dec 8: Home Minister P Chidambaram today said the Congress government made a “wrong political judgement” in 1992 of believing the BJP and the Uttar Pradesh government that led to the demolition of Babri Masjid for which P V Narasimha Rao and the party paid the price.
Winding up a two-day acrimonious discussion on the Liberhan Commission report in the Lok Sabha, Chidambaram, unlike his ministerial colleague Salman Khurshid, did not give a clean chit to Atal Bihari Vajpayee, saying though he was not present in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992,
he had delivered a speech a day earlier exhorting kar sevaks to go to Ayodhya where “demolition” took place.
In an hour-long reply that was sought to be drowned by slogan-shouting BJP members angry over some remarks of a Congress member against Vajpayee, he asserted that the demolition was a “pre-planned and cold-blooded” act conducted by the Sangh Parivar and BJP leaders like L K Advani and M M Joshi cannot escape responsibility.
“False promises, lies to the Supreme Court, lies to the Central government and you create a situation in which unfortunately the government of the day made a wrong political judgement.
“Looking back, I can say it was a wrong political judgement. Mr Narasimha Rao paid the price for making the judgement. The Congress party paid a price for that political judgement,” Chidambaram said.
Chidambaram said the then UP Chief Minister Kalyan Singh had “lied” and given “false promises” about protecting the disputed structure and regretted the Rao government had made a “wrong political judgment”.
“The promises held out by the BJP were completely false with the sole intention of misleading the Centre... The promises were to secure inaction of the Central government, to induce the Centre in a state of optimistic slumber,” Chidambaram said, adding the Congress had already paid for it.
BJP rejected the Liberhan report, saying it was a “political” document prepared by an “opportunist” to target some people and warned that it could create communal frenzy in the country. The party wanted the report to be scrapped “lock, stock and barrel”.

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