A furious Advani said that the terrorists have crossed the “Lakshman Rekha” and India will wage a decisive war against the terrorism. Why did Mr. Advani mentioned “Lakshman Rekha” ? What he really wanted to suggest by invoking this term from Ramayana, a Hindu holy book.
First let us see what is a Lakshman Rekha? According to the story of Ramayana, Rama was banished to the forest along with his wife Sita and brother Lakshman. Rama was away to hunt a deer, when he didn’t returned for a long time, Sita got concerned and therefore sent Lakshman to look for him. Lakshman before leaving Sita alone in the Jungle, drew a line around Sita with his arrow and told her that as long as she is inside that circle she will be safe. This line is called Lakshman Rekha or the Line of Lakshman, the purpose of this line was to protect Sita. Eventually Sita was tricked by Ravana an evil character to come out of the circle by crossing the line and abducted and taken away to Lanka. This led to a big fight between good ( Rama) and evil ( Ramayana).
Now coming back to Mr. Advani, keeping this story of Ramayana in mind, his statement doesn’t make any sense. First of all, who defined this Lakshman Rekha? And what was this Lakshman Rekha ? Death of many civilians in Kashmir, Punjab, Assam was still in the bounds of Lakshman Rekha but an attack on the Indian Parliament that killed some security personals was crossing the line.
Using the terminology of Ramayana, it was Sita who crossed the line therefore according to Mr. Advani the terrorists will be equated with Sita; a scary thought indeed! And horror of horror, it will make Mr. Advani and Indian Government modern day Ravana. Of course this was not what Mr. Advani meant when he uttered those terms. What he had in mind was to use the terms from Hindu religious terminology to provoke the Hindus that it is a war between Hindus and Muslims.
For a lack of a better term that describes “crusade” or “jihad” in Hindu religion, he had to come up with something, and this was the closest that Mr. Advani can come up. There was no objection from any quarters including usually active Indian opposition. Thus Mr. Advani was successful in making this a war between religions, to get the support of Hindus. Like during the movement that led to the destruction of Babri Masjid, those who don’t support Mr. Advani will be labeled Non-Hindu.
