Then came Who Is a Hindu?, about whether tribals, Buddhists etc. are Hindus, also an item with important ramifications. I zoomed in on Buddhism in my… - Koenraad Elst

Between 1988 and 1993, we saw numerous street riots; a political crisis including the fall of VP Singh's Central Government in 1990 and the rise of the pro-temple BJP from 2 seats before the elections of 1989 to 121 after those of 1991; the occasion for starting the Satanic Verses affair, with the ban on Salman Rushdie's novel as bargaining chip for the cancellation of a Muslim "march on Ayodhya"; the demolition of the mosque building on 6 December 1992 by Hindu activists defying the orders of their more prudent leaders; more political crisis with the dismissal of four BJP state governments; and a crescendo of revenge violence spilling over to Pakistan, Bangladesh, and the UK, culminating in a new model of terrorism on March 12, 1993, when simultaneous explosions at different localities in Mumbai killed hundreds....
Suddenly it seemed that the Bābrī Masjid had become the last bulwark of secularism besieged by irrational forces. This contributed substantially to the shrillness of the controversy, making it acquire a Holy War character, needlessly dramatic and bloody.

Among those who uphold the temple thesis, you find scholars who did not support the movement for replacing the mosque structure with temple architecture, and who explicitly distanced themselves from the Vishva Hindu Parishad’s campaign, e.g. Prof. A.R. Khan and archaeologist Dr. R. Nath. By contrast, I am not aware of anyone in the anti-temple party who supported the right of Hindus to build a temple at the site: every one of them explicitly subscribes to the position that Hindu attempts to reclaim this Hindu sacred site should be thwarted.

This type of gossip is very popular among illiterates who lack the habit of serious debate on issues, and of seasoned debaters who realize that in a given case, no argument ad rem will succeed, and who therefore resort to an argument ad hominem. A quotation that deserves repetition in almost every debate on the Aryan question, and many other debates besides, is: “Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.”