My family comes from a nearby village. Though my parents lived in Kolkata, we spent our summer and winter vacations in Ayodhya. In the evenings we would walk through the streets of the town, which brimmed with pilgrims of almost every faith. Hindus frequented shrines of local Muslim saints ; Muslims sold Hindu religious artifacts outside temples and revered Ram as a prophet. For residents of Ayodhya, Ram was omnipresent, but some Hindu activists claimed that Ram was born within this contested area.

Source: New York Times May 18, 2019 23:36 UTC