Kannur district in Kerala’s northern Malabar area is a poor, internally riven area of deep emotional significance to both the Left and the BJP. Despite the state having the largest number of RSS shakhas in the country, the BJP has been unsuccessful in weaning away votes from the UDF and LDF coalitions, and they have chosen to concentrate their efforts on this communally divided region as their best shot. It is also historically important to the CPM, and so the last few decades of Kannur’s political climate have been marked by sordid dealings on both sides, and cycles of violence and retribution. The latest of these resulted in five deaths on the RSS side and two on the CPM side, and great bitterness that erupted in this clash in New Delhi.

And now that the stage has been set in the capital, the national leadership must take immediate action to quell what look like wars of medieval vendetta rather than the political back-and-forth of a mature democracy. It is up to the CPM and the BJP to curb their excesses in Kannur. And this is not to assume any moral equivalence in this Delhi episode, where it is clear who the perpetrators of violence were — and the vandals must be brought to justice. Ideological battles cannot be decided by angry thugs.