We the undersigned note with grave concern the emergence of a cataclysmic situation in our country, forced upon all of us by the reckless and invidious actions of the VHP, the Bajrang Dal and the BJP. The commencement of construction of a temple at the disputed site in Ayodhya in defiance of the Allahabad High Court order is a gross violation not only of the judicial process, but also of the fundamental premises of our democratic constitution. It upsets not only the basic principles of a pluralist order, but also the minimal norms of mutual respect, without which no civilized nation can survive. What is worse, it is a shocking travesty of the deep spiritual values of care and compassion that underlie all great religions, including Hinduism. The eruption of communal riots in some parts of the country leaves us with no doubt that unless the government acts decisively now, it may be too late to repair the severe damage that has already been inflicted on our national unity. We therefore urge the government to take immediate action to implement the Allahabad High Court order and to take over the entire disputed area so that all structures built within it are protected.

Signed by:
M.S. Sathyu, Utpal Dutt, Sai Paranjape, K.N. Panikkar, Om Puri, O.V. Vijayan, Pt. Hari Prasad Chaurasia, Sitara Devi, Amol Palekar, Mani Kaul, Vivan Sundaram, N. Harikumar, Bhisham Sahni, Amiya Bagchi, Ketan Mehta, Ashok Jain, Ram Narayan, Anita Sood, Kartik Kumar, Habib Tanvir, A. Ramachandran, M.K. Raina, Govind Nihalani, Ulhas Kashalkar, Padma Kashalkar, Kumar Shahani, Rajiv Bhargava, Vikas Satwalekar, N. Ram, Zohra Sehgal, Praful Bidwai, Geeta Kapur, Gautam Ghosh, G.P. Deshpande, Gulammohammed Sheikh, Pabitra Sarkar, Madan Gopal Singh, Manjit Bawa, Vishnu Prabhakar, Shamshad, Lalith Rao, Rajeev Dhavan, Sadanand Menon, Sukumar Azhikode, O.N.V. Kurup, Satchidanandan, M. Mukundan, Arpita Singh, Paramjit Singh, Kiran Sehgal, Manmohan Bawa, A. Rahman, Sashi Kumar, Rummana Husain, Mrinalini Mukherjee, Ashish Rajyadhyaksha, Dadi Pudumjee, Tripurari Sharma, Saeed Mirza, Shama Zaidi, Shabana Azmi, Javed Akhtar, Jasodhara Bagchi, Nirmal Chandra, Nand Katyal, Ashok Bose, Ali Sardar Jafri, Chitra Palekar, Nalini Malani, Anand Patwardhan, Sudhir Patwardhan, Jehangir Sabavala, Tyeb Mehta, Pushpamalan N., Amita Dhandha, Kusum Kumar, Thomas Paul, B.T. Kaul, Monisha Dhawan, Rashmi Doraiswami, Bulbul Sharma, Sabina Sehgal, Probir Purkayastha, Dinesh Abrol, Kalpana Khosla, Manjira Dutta, S. Kalidas, Anand, Parthiv Shah, K. Ashok Rao, Habib Kidwai, Abhilasha Kumari, Usha Menon, Shiraz Sidhwa, Madhu Prasad, Tani Bhargava, Nina Rao, Gautam Navlakha, Randhir Khare, Alpana Khare,