A video dated May 2022, a short interview of “eminent historian” Irfan Habib, has been making the rounds of social media platform X for the past few days in the wake of the Pran Prathishtha ceremony of Ayodhya Ram Mandir. 

In the video, he comments on the “controversies” surrounding Varanasi’s Gyanvapi mosque and Mathura’s Shahi Idgah mosque. He says, “It is correct that Aurangzeb demolished the temple. It is not as if during those times, anything can go unnoticed. But it was not specified that it was Shivji’s temple. It became a Shiv temple after they found a Shivling; otherwise, they had given it the names of other Gods. Aurangzeb demolished this temple in Varanasi. One is in Mathura, a big temple of Keshav Rai’s. Veer Singh Bundela built it. There are no two ways about it. The question is, how can the government demolish something that was built in 1670? It is against India’s Monument Protection Act. There is a minar (pillar) of Rana Kumbha in Chittor and it has the words Allah Allah Allah written in Arabic, so is that a mosque now? There are Hindu gods and goddesses below that carving, and on top, Allah is written. Is it a mosque then? It is stupidity.”

Irfan Habib is a well-known Marxist historian in Bharat. Noted archaeologist KK Muhammad has called out Habib and other Marxist historians for misleading the public on Ayodhya/Babri Masjid despite clear archaeological evidence.

In 2016, when a fatwa issued by Deoband said no to worship of Bharat Mata, this historian contended that the concept of ‘Bharat Mata’ was a foreign import, asserting it lacks historical roots in ancient or medieval India. Despite Bharat’s rich heritage embodying the Mother Goddess, as evident in ancient texts, Habib dismissed the idea as a European import, raising questions about his subjective standards and objectivity in interpreting India’s cultural identity.

Guess what? Habib also compared RSS to ISIS! So much is his perversion to anything Hindu or Bharatiya. Speaking at a 2015 convention organized by protesting writers, historians, and scholars, Irfan Habib stated, “Judging by the way they perceive Muslims, there isn’t much difference between the Islamic State and RSS in terms of intellect.” The convention aimed to highlight increasing intolerance in the country since the BJP government assumed power, alleging that it permits ideological affiliates to propagate saffron terror.

How Irfan Habib hoodwinked the Hindus

In a video, Meenakshi Jain, author and historian, spoke about how Irfab Habib had used diversionary tactics to fool the Hindus, which caused a delay in reclaiming our land in Ayodhya. She said, “So, Professor Irfan Habib, he said that this inscription came from a private collection, but we have no record of anyone having such a big inscription. Then, 3-4 years later, he changed his line, and he said that this inscription was actually stolen from Lucknow Museum and it was planted over there. So, till now, we could not refute Irfan Habib; we could say that the inscription has fallen, but none of us had seen the inscription that he said was stolen from the Lucknow Museum. Now, the inscription that he said was stolen from the Lucknow museum is called the Treta Ka Thakur inscription. There was another temple in Ayodhya that was destroyed by Aurangzeb, which was called the Treta Ka Thakur Temple. That temple also had an inscription which was recovered by the British and kept first in Faizabad museum and later sent to Lucknow museum.”

How Irfan Habib and other left historians hoodwinked the Babri group

In another video on Sangam Talks, historian Meenakshi Jain details how the leftist historians spread lies to keep the Ramjanmabhoomi issue burning. She also adds how KK Mohammed, in his autobiography, revealed the role played by left historians to prevent the Muslims from coming to an amicable solution over the dispute. She says, “The left historians they carried out a campaign against the ASI on this issue also. I will give you some idea of what these left historians said in court because what they said in court was so atrocious that it is really amazing that anyone takes the people seriously, even today. There was an agreement among the left historians and archaeologists that the big four, that is, R.S Sharma, D.N Jha, Romila Thapar, and Irfan Habib, they will not present themselves in court but they will send their colleagues and students to make statements in court.”

Speaking about KK Mohammed, she says, “I feel what we can do is to popularize the weakness of the Babri case and the duplicitous role that some academics have played over 20 years because there is an archaeologist called K.K Muhammad. He was with the ASI, and he has written his autobiography, very recently his autobiography has come out, and in that, he says that there was very serious thinking among Muslims that let us handover this site to the Hindus because it means so much to them and it doesn’t mean much to us. He said at that moment, left historians entered the fray and they convinced the Babri group that you have a very strong case and we will fight your case and the intervention of the left historians made the Babri group changed its mind and say yes, we will fight it, so this is a very painful case of academics doing such harm to the amity between communities, to the social fabric of this country and Ayodhya has been one issue, which has caused so much tension between communities for the last 2-3 decades.” 

But for the relentless efforts of all those devotees, karsewaks, Indic historians, archaeologists, advocates, politicians, sadhus, and the tapas/penance of those millions of devotees across Bharat, we will not be seeing the Ram mandir where it is today. 

With the comments in the first video on Mathura and Kashi, the leftist historian assumes he can prevent the truth from coming out. Irfan Habib probably doesn’t know how the collective effort of devotees has found fruit in the Ayodhya matter. So to Irfan Habib, Ayodhya to bas jhaanki hai, Kashi Mathura baaki hai, we will retrieve all of them. Jai Shri Ram