Those who would like to pin too much hope on the CPI-M’s seeking quota for uplift of “Dalit Muslims”, their hopes would be dashed soon.

Recently, the Marxist party demanded reservation for the “Dalit Muslims” while arguing that many of them were still in traditional occupations as their Hindu counterparts. The argument is correct, but only partially. Why single out the “Dalit Muslims”?

The Muslims in general are largely illiterate and mired in grinding poverty. Modern education, trade and industry have not made much headway among them. They have been lagging behind by decades in industry, trade, profession and higher education. And this has created a shortage, particularly after partition, of a modern intelligentsia, modern middle class and a modern bourgeoisie - in short, of a modern civilisation among the Muslims.

Speaking in omnibus terms, Gujarat has been the issue practically since the horrendous burning of the Sabarmati Express bogies on February 27. More recently, the decisions of the BJP National Executive at its Panaji (Goa) meeting gave a new dimension to the tragedy. The average newspaper reader is interested in what has been happening; he or she can make his or her mind on them without being prompted by correspondents. Secondly, when a Frank Moraes or a Mulgaokar mounted campaign journalism against titans like Nehru himself or Indira Gandhi in the latter case, there was cerebral weight spiced with elegant, punch-packed English prose. When pigmies in their shoes borrow their plumes the result is not even pathetic. For instance, generalisation of a score or so of requests for transfer from Gujarat by Muslim employees of public sector employees into a headline, "Get us out of Gujarat: Muslim officers" is panic-mongering and positively harmful to the larger national interest; another, "someone called Vajpayee once said: we never fish for votes in blood", drips with melodrama.