Namo turns on Hindutva heat

His party seemed intent on making corruption and inflation the main election issues but Narendra Modi is showing clear signs that he prefers religious polarisation as a poll tactic. Vikas Pathak reports.

His party seemed intent on making corruption and inflation the main election issues but Narendra Modi is showing clear signs that he prefers religious polarisation as a poll tactic.

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Two back-to-back statements - the "puppy" remark that seemed to trivialise the killings of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002 and the deliberate reference to the "burqa" of the Congress' secularism - have ratcheted up the heat in a matter of days.

With this, the BJP seems headed back to its early 1990s' pitch, where polarisation led to poll performance.