... Gandhiji had often said, in most unambiguous terms, that unless these two evils - communalism and untouchability - are done away with, India has no right to independence from British raj. Ultimately he fell a victim to an intolerant cult - a heinous type of nationalism heavily tainted by orthodoxy. This nationalism set off a chain reaction of Hindu and Muslim communalism.

Gandhiji had staked his life for restoring communal harmony because, as he perceived it, breakdown of communal peace on account of rise of majority communalism, even if in retaliation, undermined the basic fabric of India's social life. Regrettably and to our ill luck, he failed. The situation today is more serious and more dangerous, for we do not have another Gandhi on the horizon. Worse still, smaller men dominate the scene today ... It is, therefore, important that human rights and social activists involved in people's movement imbibe the non-communal and humanist philosophy of Gandhiji which is so very urgently needed in our country today - and wage war on this cancerous evil. (Source: The Mainstream, 27 June, 1998)