9. It is said that the act of destruction by Babur was not a religious one, but had a political     motive. Please comment.

The act has to be interpreted in terms of the one who committed it. From what Babur has written about himself in his Babur Nama, it is clear that his intention was also to spread Islam. His actions after his victories also attest to this fact. It is true that he had a political mantle in terms of being a ruler. But in Islam most of the rulers also did take all actions to propagate their religion. This is something that has happened all over the world, and the treatment meted out in India to the Hindus is no exception.

If Babur was purely a political person, there would have been no need, one, to destroy a place of worship of the indigenous people and, two, to construct an alien place of worship and/or victory monument where such destruction took place. The fact that the Babri structure was built after destroying a temple in honour of Shri Rama establishes the religious nature of the act.

Whether it is destroyed for a religious reason or for a political one, the Babri structure, supposed to be a Muslim place of worship, would still be termed as a monument of the slavery and subjugation of the Hindus. Also, since it was built after destroying Shri Rama's temple, the recovery of the site is still justified. The Hindus are not asking for the return of the thousands of the vandalised sites, but only three that are the most important to them in their tradition.