With all due respect to their Lordships, the Supreme Court will have to wave the judicial equivalent of a magic wand if there is to be any acceptance of its desire that the Ramjanambhoomi-Babari Masjid case be treated as simple title-suit. For had the decades-old controversy been a dispute over a mere 2.77 acres of land the “issue” would never have snowballed into the society-splitting time-bomb that it has become.

True there can be little adjudication on a “matter of faith” ~ but that is what the Allahabad High Court had unsuccessfully attempted. So unless the apex court has the capacity expand the scope of its authority, the political-religious impasse is likely to persist even after its final orders are pronounced.

The consequences could rip the national fabric to shreds ~ as had happened when the “structure” (as a section of the political leadership prefers to call it) was vandalised. The apex court is presently bogged down with internal troubles and is fighting a running battle with the government over the appointment of judges, so the people are unlikely to be favoured by a judicial solution to a vexed national crisis. That passions can run wild even in the courtroom was proven a few months back, and a mini-flashback was provided at the most recent hearing.

The Bench headed by the Chief Justice has held in abeyance a series of intervention-applications ~ many of them clearly politically flavoured ~ and has also spoken of thousands of other litigants awaiting justice. How that will match up with the argument that the sentiments of “crores of Hindus” are linked with the case is the task before their Lordships. The attempt of the High Court to assuage feelings by a trifurcation of the disputed property proved a flop ~ all three parties moved the Supreme Court in appeals against it.

The eyes of the nation, nay large parts of the world, will be concentrated on this most demanding of judicial determinations. The law, and judicial authority, have been openly questioned and defied on the comparatively trivial affair of the film Padmaavat: every aspect of the rule of law would be “stretched” by the Ayodhya case.

Most other ways out were blocked when the original mosque was razed ~ the television pictures of the demolition still haunt. And could provide a starting-point for a fresh conflagration unless their Lordships come up with a miracle. Regardless of the eventual judicial decision, already “convicted” has been the failure of successive governments to provide the inspirational leadership required for a negotiated settlement.

The executive has shamelessly passed the buck on to the judiciary, and done little to de-politicise an explosive sectarian controversy. Good governance has ever eluded the Indian people ~ the Nehrus, Gandhis, Vajpayees, Rao and Modi (to name just a few) have collectively come up short of what the voter had desired.