Modi's next test: The 'other' minority issue

February 22, 2015 00:28

Much as you detest some old British politicians and their ghisa-pita old cliches, you can't help falling back on them. It just so happens that nobody has written a better description of the unpredictable nature of democracy than Harold Wilson's "a week is a long time (in) politics".

And remember, he said this in 1964, when a week wasn't really such a long period of time.

That is precisely what happened over 48 hours last week. First, Prime Minister Narendra Modi surprised us by accepting an invitation from Christian groups to speak at a commemoration for two Indians recently beatified, and never mind that it was on the day of Mahashivratri.

He chose that forum to firmly state what is, after all, no more than a restatement of the central proposition of the Constitution he has been sworn in to protect. This was followed, as if choreographed, by a statement from RSS Sarsanghchalak Mohan Bhagwat that Hindu women were not baby-bearing factories and thereby rubbishing Sakshi Maharaj, one of the BJP MPs in saffron.

Sure enough, both correctives were deliberate, if instigated by the setback in Delhi.

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