Missing: The Muslim link

Both Mohsina and Salman vehemently deny the charge that the party is taking a blatant ‘‘soft Hindutva’’ approach so that it’s not seen as allying too much with Muslims which could earn it negative points from the majority community voters.

Khurshid, however, admits this much: ‘‘Our approach has been a result of strategic fine-tuning. Modi is already on a sticky wicket. He has a lot to explain, why give him a chance to score? We realise Modi may get high percentage of votes where incidents (of rioting) took place; but overall the BJP will not bag many seats. And we are cornering him on important matters like collapse of administration and law and order and lack of basic amenities like water.’’

Kidwai — who feels strongly about being described simply as a ‘‘Muslim leader’’ — says she’s too busy with Himachal Pradesh as AICC general secretary in-charge of the state (the elections there are due in February). However, almost as an afterthought, she says that nobody had asked her to go to Gujarat either.

‘‘I can’t say if not sending Muslim leaders to Gujarat is a strategic design. But then I don’t believe that my party has taken a soft Hindutva line. Look at Modi — he starts everything from Godhra and ends at Godhra,’’ she says.

However, none of the Congress leaders — Muslim or otherwise — comes out with a convincing explanation as to why Sonia Gandhi omitted Godhra from her election itinerary. Or why she cancelled the Iftar party this year? (the official explanation, which in any case doesn’t have many buyers, is that it had to do with the drought and farmers’ misery).

Salman, a veteran of many electoral battles in UP, offers a brand new explanation: the Muslims of Gujarat are not like their counterparts in Bihar and UP. ‘‘Rather than seeing their man winning an election or campaigning, the Gujarat Muslims are more concerned about developmental issues and matters affecting their day to day life.’’

Salman says he understands that Kamal Nath, Sonia’s point-man from New Delhi currently campaigning in Gujarat, was in regular touch with the prominent Muslim leaders of the state. ‘‘Our strategy,’’ he adds, ‘‘also consist of sending prominent Hind leaders to Muslim belts. They reach out to them and spend time with them. This is much more important; sending or not sending a Muslim leader to them is irrelevant.’’

Congress’ chief spokesman, S Jaipal Reddy, declined to give a direct reply. When contacted in Hyderabad, he said he believed that several party leaders were campaigning in Gujarat. ‘‘But I won’t be in a position to react off-hand,’’ he said.

Ahmed Patel, the lone Delhi-based Muslim Congressman now in Ahmedabad, has his political roots well entrenched in Gujarat. As such, nobody here, not even the Congressmen, consider him an aberration to their ‘‘strategic fine-tuning.’’

With the BJP this, obviously, can’t be such a big issue. But the absence of Union Civil Aviation Minister Shahnawaz Hussain and party general secretary Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, for long groomed to succeed Kerala Governor Sikandar Bakht as the Muslim faces of the party, has been noted.

At a time when Modi and VHP leaders are desperate to achieve a total communal polarisation, there are obviously no takers for the two Muslim leaders amongst the 182 candidates who are all Hindus.

‘‘I am overseeing the tour programmes of senior party leaders from here,’’ Naqvi said today. ‘‘What about Shahnawaz Hussain, then?’’ He responded that ‘‘he is also busy here.’’

As for the party’s failure to field a single Muslim candidate, Naqvi said, ‘‘The selection of candidates depends upon many considerations, the ability to win being the foremost.’’ Then he quickly pointed out that even the Congress, which used to put up over a dozen candidates, had fielded only five this time. ‘‘No Muslim leaders of the Congress are campaigning either,’’ he said.

(With input from Pradeep Kaushal)