To continually comment on extreme observations from several middle-level leaders of the saffron brigade might appear like the needle getting stuck in a gramophone record of yesteryear.

Yet it would be cowardly not to speak up at the manner in which the “fringe” element ~ significantly, nobody refers to the “lunatic fringe” any more since there are signs of method in the madness ~ appears to have been given licence to run amuck as the curtain rises on 2019.

The suspicion is that the ground is being baited to net a rich, polarised, haul in the next parliamentary poll. Not even the Ambedkar anniversary was spared ~ while the President and Prime Minister hailed the statute crafted by the man whose statue is now being shamelessly defiled, a junior minister in Mr Modi’s council said there was need to revisit the Constitution which had been interpreted to accord the minorities a more advantageous position than the majority community.

True that during Atal Bihari Vajpayee’ NDA-I a panel had been set up to review the working of the Constitution, but that been inspired by factors rather different from those highlighted by the minister of state for human resources development, Satya Pal Singh at an Ambedkar-related function in Delhi University ~ his were no stray, off-the-cuff remarks from a political soap-box.

“In the last about two decades, the way our Constitution has been interpreted and the laws have been interpreted, it requires a revisit. The kind of rights that have been granted to the minorities, still they feel cheated about it. They have the right to run their institutions, but the majority does not.”

He advocated more teeth for the law but chose a bizarre illustration: “somebody who has committed a theft of Rs 100 gets the same kind of punishment who has theft of Rs 100 crore. But does it really give justice to society”.

Funny, only a day or so earlier a BJP leader from Haryana described the Meo community (a localised minority one) as “criminals, specialising in love jihad”.

So, now, even equality under the law is being frowned upon. Should the Indian Penal Code be re-written with a religion/community angle? To list the series of assaults on the Dalits and minorities would only be to confirm to the perpetrators that their point had got home: perhaps encourage further forays like the infamy at Kathua, or lynch-mobs masquerading as gau rakshaks.

Only a strong signal from the Prime Minister will remedy the situation, otherwise as 2019 nears the simmering pot will boil over. And radicalisation will cease to have a solely Islamic connotation in the international lexicon.

The Prime Minister’s stress on development does not really harmonise with the divisive chorus his party activists are providing as background music.