In the Ayodhya debate, the comparison with the Jerusalem Temple Mount controversy has been made only sparingly. And when it was made, it was mostly turned upside down. It was assumed that in both cases, a mosque is threatened with a takeover by non-Muslims, and that is the relevant similarity. Stefan de Girval has put it this way : "(The Jews) want to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem, which was destroyed by the Romans in the first century AD. But they face the same problem and dilemma that the Hindus are facing at the Ram Janmabhoomi site." The non-Muslim communities involved in these two temple- mosque-controversies do indeed have things in common. They both have voluntarily and unilaterally set up a secular state. Their creations, upon departure of the British, were both at the same time partitions into a secular and an Islamic state. In both cases, the partition was immediately followed by an invasion from the Muslim neighbour (here there is a remarkable difference