Refusing to take credit for the incident, unlike the pride it took in the Ferozshah Kotla incident or disrupting scheduled shows of Fire or digging the cricket pitch at Mumbai's Wankhede stadium, the Sena has taken a hurried retreat from its aggressive stand and maintained that ``the men at the BCCI were not Shiv Sainiks''.

This comes close on the heels of the BJP hardening its position earlier in the day after Union Home Minister, L K Advani's, meeting with BJP ministers and MLAs. Sources said that the BJP had decided to ``cut all communication'' with the Sena after the BCCI incident.

BJP'a deliberations on the issue has given a clear signal that neither the party nor the governmentcould continue being embarrassed by the Sena on the Indo-Pak cricket issue. A senior BJP leader termed the Sena's recent tactics as ``a death wish for the alliance''.

Realising that the party had out-reached itself on the BCCI incident and anticipating the widespread censure, the Sena mouthpiece stated that the damage done to the BCCI office and cricket trophies was the work of ``agitated youths'' and an attempt to malign the Sena. ``We don't know who they were but deplore such things,'' Thackeray said. Meanwhile, the State Home Ministry has instructed the Mumbai police to investigate into the BCCI attack and take action against those found guilty.

``The Sena is always proud of what its boys do and would have had no problem taking credit for the BCCI attack if the involvement of Sainiks was true, said Thackeray, adding, ``we never refuse to take responsibility.'' However, asked if these youth were ``patriots'' - Sena had termed its Kotla pitch diggers as true patriots - Thackeray laughed it off. He alsosaid that the Congress, particularly Chhagan Bhujbal who is Sena's bete-noire, had dragged MLA Srikant Sarmalkar's name into the BCCI attack.

BJP sources said that their efforts will continue to persuade the senior Thackeray to withdraw the current agitation against the cricket series. ``Now that they have denied participation in the attack and condemned it, there's no problem,'' said a senior BJP leader. However, Thackeray has not called off his threats to disrupt the cricket matches or harass the visiting team. The BJP is keeping its fingers crossed that the Sena will ``come to its senses soon and refrain from making an ugly law-and-order situation.''

Should that happen, the BJP will consider snapping ties with its alliance partner of nearly 18 years, but believes that such a situation may not arise because today's denial is Sena's conciliatory gesture. ``We could not continue being embarrassed as a party and as union government by threats and things like that. But it would have been foolish to breakties over an issue that Sena is reacting to emotionally. Now they seem to have been chastened,'' the leader stated.

Embarrassed to the bone by the growing incidence of violence on the Indo-Pak cricket series, the BJP had decided to cold shoulder the Sena; politically, it meant that the BJP would not react to or negotiate with the Sena if it persisted in escalating tension in the country as well as between India and Pakistan on the cricket issue. Party sources said that the strategy was adopted after L K Advani took stock of the situation late last night on his return to New Delhi.

Incidentally, Union Information and Broadcasting Minister, Pramod Mahajan, regarded as the architect of the BJP-Sena alliance in Maharashtra, appeared to have shifted his stand in the last two days after the attack on the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) office. Staunchly opposed to any severing of ties despite the alliance relationship souring in the last six months, Mahajan mentioned late Monday night that thefate of the alliance would depend on many factors. It was his first ambiguous and non-categorical statement on the subject of alliance politics.