Hindu youths clamour atop the 16th century Muslim Babri Mosque in this December 6, 1992 file photo five hours before the structure was completely demolished by hundreds supporting Hindu fundamentalist activists. In 1947 India and Pakistan were ripped savagely apart. In 1997 there are a growing number of people who would like them stitched back together again. The trauma of partition persists and fears seemed to be underlined by the evocative image of Ayodhya, when the mosque was torn down amid claims that it had been built on the site of a former Hindu temple built where Lord Rama was born.

A family watches a TV news channel in a room in the northern Indian town of Ayodhya, September 30, 2010. More than 200,000 police fanned out across India and temporary jails were set up as the government prepared for possible Hindu-Muslim riots over one of the most divisive court cases in the nation's history. The government has appealed for calm once a court in Uttar Pradesh state later on Thursday rules which religion owns the site of a 16th century mosque, a flashpoint that flared in 1992 and triggered some of India's worst riots that killed about 2,000 people.