(Samaj Weekly)
– Vidya Bhushan Rawat
Vineet Maurya is a Buddhist activist based in Ayodhya. He has been fighting to preserve the Buddhist heritage of Saket which according to many was the Buddhist name for Ayodhya. Historians are claiming that Ayodhya had a Buddhist past and there are number of places with Buddhist heritage in Ayodhya but they remain under the encroachment now. Recently, when the Ram Janambhumi Nyas started the process of digging at the Temple complex, a number of historical artifacts were found. The digging was not done by professionals but purely for the purpose of building the Ram Temple. Vineet felt that he is certain that there are extremely important Buddhist artifacts under the structure and hence any construction activity should only be allowed under the Archeological Survey of India so that if historical artifacts are found then they will be preserved. Sharing this conversation with Vineet Maruya on the issue.
