A day after the B S Yeddyurappa Government rejected demands for a ban on the Bajrang Dal, three new cases of attacks on churches in Karnataka on Sunday, including in Bangalore, have left the BJP red-faced.

While the Chief Minister was closeted with top officials, including home minister V S Acharya, till late in the night, the fresh attacks on churches fly in the face of BJP’s assertions that the “Centre’s advisories to the state were an attempt to discriminate against non-Congress governments”.

“The Centre’s action (of sending advisories) is an attempt to target non-Congress governments and deflect attention from the anger across the country against terrorism,” claimed the party’s new poster boy Narendra Modi. “The Government is soft on the ISI but hard on the RSS,” said M Venkaiah Naidu.

The dramatis personae of the Karnataka riots, however, have a different take altogether. Apart from Bajrang Dal state convenor Mahendra Kumar , Pramod Mutalik, a former Bajrang Dal functionary, is believed to have led attacks on the churches.

Mutalik, who now heads the Sri Ram Sena, told The Indian Express: “The BJP Government in the state has been extremely supportive. Praveenbhai Togadia, Umadidi (Uma Bharati) are our source of inspiration.” On the role of his organisation, he said: “We are retaliating because we are being provoked.”

He is now said to be raising “Hindu suicide squads”. “We plan to train the youth for the nationalist cause. We hope to get the support of the police personnel for training them,” Mutalik added.

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