THE inauguration on Monday of Ram Temple, built in Ayodhya 32 years after a Hindu nationalist mob demolished the Mughal-era Babri Masjid, drew criticism from home and abroad alike.

A prominent US-based Hindu group accused Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi of `weaponising` their faith and using the Ram Temple for political gain, CNNreported.

`The Ram Temple is being built on the ruins of a sacred medieval mosque destroyed by a Hindu nationalist mob, on a long contested holy site in India,` a statement from Hindus for Human Rights said.

`Objections include the fact that Mr Modi is not a religious leader and so not qualified to lead the [inauguration] ceremony, and that a Hindu temple cannot be consecrated before it is completed,` the statement said. `Mr Modi rushing through and fronting it himself is the latest attempt to weaponise Hinduism in the name of the BJP`s repressive nationalist ideology, ahead of national elections in May,` it added.

Hindus for Human Rights is a US-based non-profit advocacy group founded in 2019 that advocates for pluralism, civil and human rights in South Asia and North America, according to its website.

The BJP`s main opposition, the Indian National Congress, said the event is being politicised by the ruling BJP.

Responding to the Congress`s decisionto miss the ceremony, BJP spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi told reporters it was driven by `jealousy, malice and inferiority complex towards Prime Minister Narendra Modi,` adding that the party is opposing the `country` and `god.

Some prominent Muslim lawmakers also criticised the inauguration of the temple, lamenting the loss of the Babri mosque where their ancestors recited the Holy Quran hundreds of years ago.

`Young people, we have lost our Masjid (mosque) and you are seeing what is being done there,` said Asaduddin Owaisi, chief of the All India Majlis-i-Ittehadul Muslimeen political party, to his followers during a speech earlier this month.

`Don`t you have pain in your hearts?` Moreover, an Indian journalist Betwa Sharma said in a conversation with Al-Jazeera: `If you celebrate while someone else is in pain, something is broken in our society.

Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay, author of The Demolition and the Verdict, a book about the 1992 mosque demolition, said Mr Modi`s decision to preside over Monday`s festivities is a sign of `Hindu hegemony` in India.

`Lines between politics and religions have got blurred,` he said of Mr Modi`s involvement in the ceremony in a country that is constitutionally secular.

`They have also got completely blurred between religion and the Indian state.

You have at the moment the Indian prime minister who is actually participating in a purely religious activity, with full participation of the government machinery.