Lackluster NIC meet neither national nor integrated

Only 16 chief ministers attended the day-long conference,with Narendra Modi,Mamata Banerjee,Jayalalithaa and Naveen Patnaik among those who stayed away,taking the sheen off the deliberations.

Related: PM cautions against ‘immature’ handling of social media

Apart from calls to monitor and regulate social media,there were not many concrete suggestions as chief ministers and political leaders sang old tunes in line with their ideological and political positions and a clear eye on the general elections.

Under attack for the way in which the riots in Muzaffarnagar were handled,Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh made their presence felt,and like Nitish Kumar,Lalu Prasad and Prakash Karat,hit out at the Sangh Parivar.

Significantly,neither Patnaik nor Jayalalithaa — whose speeches were read by their representatives — or Bengal Finance Minister Amit Mitra attacked the BJP although they spoke about communal tensions.

In fact,Jayalalithaa said “the sharp deceleration of economic growth in the recent past and the persistent high inflation caused in substantial measure by the gross macro-economic mismanagement of the UPA government at the Centre have also no doubt contributed to social tensions”.

Nitish Kumar said,“the number,frequency,and magnitude of religious processions are also generally increasing. These are sometimes given innovative names like ‘yatra’ or ‘parikrama’,taken out any time of the year and over a larger area. This is unwarranted”.

“Some forces fan the fire of communal tensions in order to polarise the situation in their favour,” Kumar,whose JD(U) snapped ties with the BJP recently,said referring to Muzaffarnagar.

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan argued that the immediate provocation for communalism was “vote bank politics” and asserted that “a solution to this problem cannot be found by holding a particular party or particular organisation a scapegoat for one’s failures”. He said no BJP-ruled state had witnessed major communal riots in the last 10 years because these states did not nurture religious groups as vote banks.

Akhilesh Yadav argued that “some major political parties are indulging in a dangerous effort to mislead the people and disturb communal harmony for making political gains with the 2014 Lok Sabha elections in mind”. There are efforts to polarise the population,he said and referred to the VHP’s Ayodhya yatra which he claimed was “planned with a purpose to disturb the communal harmony for political gains”.

Although he did not name anyone,Akhilesh suggested that “political parties” are trying to foment communal tension in the state. SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav,in this context,was learnt to have mounted a veiled attack on the BJP by referring to the BJP’s UP in-charge Amit Shah without naming him.

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah too targeted the BJP in the context of its attack on the Prime Minister and Congress president Sonia Gandhi for visiting Muzaffarnagar. Quoting a BJP leader who had called their visit “secular tourism”,he wondered if senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley’s bid to visit Kishtwar,by that yardstick,was “communal tourism.”

Sources said Jaitley argued the feeling that the majority religion was dominating other communities was not correct.

Related: PM addresses NIC meeting,says communal riots a challenge to democracy

Modi not only skipped the session but chose not to deliver a speech through a representative like some other chief ministers. And although he was missing,his presence was felt as the secular camp used the conference to hit out at him.

“Gujarat riots executor and general manager Amit Shah has reached UP as in-charge of the state and is trying to spread his wings to Bihar too. Muzaffarnagar is just the beginning…they will create much more communal tension,” Lalu told reporters. He also claimed Modi deliberately skipped the meeting because he “feared that he will be cornered today”.

Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde said it was the duty of chief ministers to attend NIC meetings and a “leader like” Modi should have taken part.