It reveals a far more careful debate about faith, State power, and the meaning of secularism in a newly independent India. Long before Nehru entered this debate, Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had drawn clear limits on State involvement in religious reconstruction. Nehru had no issue with the temple, but his real concern was the authority of the State being harnessed to religious symbolism. His anxiety was rooted in the belief that religious symbolism, once legitimised by government power, acquires a political afterlife far beyond its immediate moment. The arc from Somnath to Ayodhya thus illustrates how religious symbolism can produce consequences far removed from its original historical context — the danger Nehru had warned against in 1951.

Source: The Telegraph January 13, 2026 03:50 UTC