It is true that in the decades in which India was ruled imperiously by the Congress, the task of writing history textbooks was allotted to Leftist hi… - Tavleen Singh

It was the first time an Indian prime minister had been so open about his religion and a tremor of fear went up the ‘secular’ spine of Lutyens’ Delhi. Friends who had never see the Ganga puja or Benares said that they loved the ceremony but they were worried about the message this would send to Muslims and Christians. So they readied their ammunition for the attack on Modi’s secular credentials that began within months of his becoming prime minister.

There was disappointment in Nehru’s leadership, but it never took away from the deep regard in which he was held for decades after he died. He was credited with bequeathing to India democracy and pluralism, and if anyone challenged the achievements of Nehruvian socialism, as V.S. Naipaul did in An Area of Darkness, he was reviled.

If this was indeed the plan it unraveled early that morning when a Belgian Indologist and Hindutva sympathizer called Koenraad Elst had to be sent home in disgrace because of his remark on Islam. It was not what he said about Islam that was wrong so much as the offensive manner in which he said it... A Muslim diplomat stood up halfway through Elst's speech and walked out. Ram Madhav, who was seated in the front row, intervened and the session was abruptly ended.... The next thing we knew was that Elst had been put back on a flight back to Belgium. The conference was intended to create a new idea of India but definitely not one in which there would be no room for Muslims.