The BJP’s reaction is just as important. From winning 57 Lok Sabha seats from UP in 1998, the BJP is reduced to 10. And with polls predicting the BJP scrambling for third place once again, galvanising the base makes electoral sense. Varun Gandhi, arms outstretched in messianic zeal, certainly hoped to do just that. And if the sporadic clapping and gentle tittering of the audience in the grainy video is any indication, they got the message. All the more important, thus, that the BJP condemn the speech and discipline Gandhi. Any sign of equivocation for electoral gain — and the BJP’s cautious “we condemn the contents of the speech, but it might be doctored” approach is exactly that — will help spread the poison of those words.

A penitent sinner, proactive watchdog and introspective party will help end this sordid affair. But there’s another voice that needs to be heard — the people’s. As it is, liberal theory finds it hard to defend limits to free speech of any kind. It’s even harder to defend curbs on political speech while campaigning — after all, should not the voter hear everything before deciding? Even legally, since “democracy” is part of the sacred “basic structure” of India’s Constitution, it can be argued that any limit to campaign speech (under Article 19(2)) is “undemocratic” and so unconstitutional. Better then, that the ultimate censors be the voter, the certificate the ballot. It’s worked before. In the 2006 Senate elections in the United States, George Allen — a conservative senator and presidential aspirant from Virginia — was videotaped calling an Indian boy a “macaca” (monkey). The courts did nothing. But the court of public opinion did. Sureshot Allen lost to a neophyte; his presidential suit is now in tatters.

... contd.