PM among 200 people to attend Ram Temple foundation ceremony

<p>Prime Minister Narendra&nbsp;Modi&nbsp;will lay the foundation stone of the Ram Mandir&nbsp;on August 5. Swami Govind Dev Giri, Treasurer of Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Tirtha Kshetra&nbsp;Trust said that to ensure appropriate physical distancing only 200 people, including 150 invitees will be allowed to attend the ceremony. He also added that all chief ministers will be invited for the event.&nbsp;</p> <p>PM Modi will offer prayers to Lord&nbsp;Ram at the temple &amp; Lord Hanuman at Hanuman Garhi Temple before laying the foundation stone, Swami Govind&nbsp;Dev Giri&nbsp;said.&nbsp;</p> <p>Former deputy prime minister L K Advani and other frontline leaders of the Ram Janmabhoomi agitation will be invited to the &ldquo;bhumi pujan&rdquo; for the construction of the Ayodhya temple, a Ram Mandir trust member had said on Tuesday.</p> <p>Kameshwar Chaupal, a member of Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra, a trust set up by the Centre to oversee the construction of the temple, had said they will invite former deputy PM L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi, Uma Bharti and Vinay Katiyar.</p> <p>Currently, the BJP leaders are facing a trial in the Babri Masjid demolition case.</p> <p>The trust has kept it in mind that former deputy prime minister Lal Krishna Advani, along with other leaders, took the Ram Mandir movement to the masses, Chaupal&nbsp;had said.</p> <p>Santosh Dubey, an accused in the Babri Masjid demolition case, had said the present generation of BJP leaders was not active in the Ram Mandir movement, which &ldquo;mobilised the Hindu masses&rdquo; to vote for the party.</p> <p>&ldquo;But the senior leaders who started the Ram Mandir movement and mobilised the community are now in political exile,&rdquo; Dubey said.</p> <p>Ram Mandir trust spokesperson Nritya Gopal Das said five silver bricks will be placed inside the sanctum sanctorum during the ceremony.</p> <p>The bricks are believed to symbolise five planets as per the Hindu mythology, he said, adding that the design and the architecture of the temple is the same as the one proposed.</p> <p>According to reports, Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat , Maharashtra Chief Minister Udhav Thackeray and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar are also on the list of invitees.</p> <p>The Supreme Court in November last year ruled in favour of the construction of a Ram temple at the disputed site where the Babri Masjid once stood.</p> <p>The Babri Masjid was demolished in December 1992 by kar sevaks who claimed that the mosque in Ayodhya was built on the site of an ancient Ram temple.</p> <p><br />&nbsp;</p>