Handling them, therefore, could be an extremely tricky affair. While the Sangh Parivar remains oblivious to larger societal changes, Advani has been clever enough to rope in new-age Hindu saints — their Hindutva is often more accommodative and the RSS cannot outright dismiss them. No wonder then, that Advani got Rishikesh’s Swami Chidanand Saraswati to mediate between the Bajrang Dal and Christian community leaders in Orissa.

The Congress has, however, not adequately understood the import of endogenous community responses. While its leaders like Mohsina Kidwai advocated the need to back Deoband-like anti-terror declarations, the party was found wanting when faced the Jamia Nagar shootout.

Consider, for instance, if a team comprising leaders like Mohsina Kidwai, C.K. Jaffer Sharif, A.R. Antulay, Salman Khursheed, Rashid Alvi and Noor Bano had visited Jamia Nagar immediately after the shootout with two talking points — that deviants sympathetic to terror needed to be isolated, and that they (and hence the largely Muslim populace there) represented the idea of India as much as Delhi Police Inspector M.C. Sharma (who died in the encounter there) did. They would thus have would have taken the wind out of the BJP’s sails on its most-potent campaign issue. More importantly, India’s Grand Old Party would have been spared the embarrassment that it has recently had to face.

suman.jha@expressindia.com