The unprecedented win of the BJP in 2014 explosively released a repressed saffron chant that was kept subdued to enable the “development rhetoric” of the party’s chief campaigner to dominate the narrative. Two years of crusade were then zealously pursued, selectively defining nationalism in the form of a beef ban and love jihad and wielded in a crude manner. The reassertion now of the government in toning down cattle sale curbs is too late (Editorial – “End to cattle curbs”, April 12). The fringe has since shifted focus to the fractious caste divide. With job creation practically non-existent, high levels of caste-based reservations in government jobs have mobilised unemployed youth to sport a saffron pendant. In yielding to such wild brigades in the hope of electoral leverage, the BJP has fallen between its two main planks — development and governance.
R. Narayanan,
Navi Mumbai
