Forget Babri Masjid — temple officials are shooting each other in a struggle over wealthy temple trusts in Ayodhya:

The rivalry spilled over after a meeting on January 31, when the two rival chief priests came to blows, prompting their associates to draw out double-barrel guns and fire… Earlier, in 2001, Nrityagopal had survived a bomb attack in the ongoing dispute over the trust… Gripped by a sense of insecurity, officials of temple trusts are rushing for gun licences… At least 350 Ayodhya residents, most of them temple-trust heads, have acquired licensed arms. The town has over 1,500 such trusts… Most key temple trusts have also installed their private army of securitymen…

Murder is but the least of their talents:

The temple town was further sullied when police in Lucknow said they were looking for another mahant [temple official], Shyam Shukla alias Shyam Maharaj, in the abduction of a Kanpur industrialist and two of his associates… “The mahant needed money. He asked us to abduct Ravinder Kedia. We kept him in Bahraich till we obtained ransom…”