.. The Maharashtra government tried to stop the tabling of the Commission report in the Assembly. When pushed to the wall by the opposition they yielded but only to reject its findings. Since then, they have initiated a misinformation campaign against the contents of the report, terming it "anti-Hindu" and "pro-Muslim" ..

The rejection of the report ... is yet another instance of the government's lack of respect for the rule of law. It is not a mere coincidence that the belligerence in Maharashtra is matched by an equally fierce aggressiveness in other BJP-ruled states.

In Gujarat auto drivers have been forced by the sangh parivar activists to display their religious identities on their vehicles. At same time, the state government has set up a special cell to "look into and monitor" Hindu-Muslim marriages. This intrusion into the private lives of ordinary citizens followed the Bardoli riots where an entire village was wiped clean of Muslims after an inter-religious marriage ignited communal passions.

In Uttar Pradesh there is a concerted effort to malign premier Islamic centres of learning like Nadwat-ul-Ulema and the Darul-Uloom, Deoband ... which have a nationalist past and an impeccably clean post-independence record.  Police officers with proven anti-Muslim bias have been posted in Saharanpur and not surprisingly they are generating an unsubstantiated hysteria about "illegal Bangladeshis, ISI and other brands of terrorists".

It is in this context of religious discrimination that the Home Minister's demand for a review of the constitution sounds dangerous ... It is time ... to see the sangh parivar not simply as pro-Hindu or anti-Muslim but as an.