The BJP's extraordinary capacity for dissimulation is .. known. All through the long years when it was a part of the non-Congress camp, it never breathed a word about the Ayodhya temple. It was only in the mid-eighties that it came out of the closet in this respect, after the VHP had tested the political waters and certified that the issue could be exploited. However, such secretiveness was on national issues. No one could have dreamed that the BJP would so recklessly chart out its own course in the international field and (make) the war clouds hover overing the sub-continent ..

The manner in which the BJP played the game of nuclear poker underlined a cold-blooded attitude devoid of any thought for the consequences which has had few  parallels in recent Indian politics, except perhaps the imposition of the Emergency in 1975.

One reason why the BJP may have been able to maintain its secret was that its allies comprised the oddballs of Indian politics - opportunists like  Ramakrishna Hegde who negotiated simultaneously with the BJP and the Congress before joining the former, an adventurist like Fernandes who is probably not taken seriously even by the Chinese, politicians like Jayalalitha and Mamata Banerjee who cannot see beyond their respective States, a novice like Naveen Patnaik who is probably so busy learning his mother tongue that he has no time to brush up on his politics. Like the BJP, they have little experience of governance at the central level, let alone nuclear diplomacy. With no one to warn it of the fateful consequences, the BJP may have felt free to blunder along merrily.

Considering that the party had thought of taking the nuclear road in 1996 ... What prompted it was presumably the realisation that since the Ram temple plank could no longer be exploited, the party needed another equally, if not more, emotive issue ... Even while shifting its emphasis from one issue to another, the party retains its faith in the efficacy of a certain emotive approach. In championing the Hindutva cause, for instance, it painted a highly exaggerated picture of Hindu vulnerability. Its case was that the Hindus were under a great threat in their only country in the world from the Muslims who  had other homelands and who were breeding at such apace in India with their four wives that they would soon become the majority. And while this demographic catastrophe was looming over the heads and "pseudo-liberals" were bent on appeasing the Muslims and other minorities, making them ever more bold in insisting on privileged treatment.

To this paranoia about the vulnerability of Hindus

A sophisticated approach might not have appealed to the BJP's core constituency. The BJP's machismo has to be demonstrated by threatening Pakistan with dire consequences ... Such muscle-flexing may even hamper any peace effort lest the BJP's supporters wonder why their party is pursuing the ... Gujral doctrine. For them, the BJP is still fighting the medieval wars against Muslims. For Pakistan, the BJP's wanton behaviour has come as a blessing in disguise ... Islamabad's life- long ambition of ... parity with India has been achieved ...India's overwhelming strength in conventional arms has also been neutralised at one stroke ... The ruling establishment in Islamabad may be secretly pleased at having been able to use the present opportunity to dispense with the inconvenience of maintaining a democratic structure ... (Source: The Hindustan Times, 13 July, 1998)