Little will provide the leadership of the BJP a more satisfying dose of its sinister brand of thrill than the public writing off the latest anti-Muslim outburst from Sakshi Maharaj, MP, as just another instance of a “fringe element” shooting his mouth off. And people noting that those provocative comments were not in accordance with the official party line.

This has happened far too frequently to retain a degree of credibility. This time too it was left to a political “pin-weight”, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, to remind everyone that this “shouldn’t be seen as the party’s stand”. More telling was the law minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad, evading comment when quizzed about the MP from Unnao blaming the Muslim community for the population explosion, and questioning the practice of four wives and triple talaq.

What is really significant is that both the Prime Minister and the BJP president have yet again looked the other way: adding to the widespread belief that the series of such vicious comments from saffron stalwarts are part of a gameplan. Those conveniently dubbed “fringe elements” are encouraged to spread political poison, and even more conveniently the leadership distances itself from what it calls “personal” remarks.

Not a single person has been reprimanded for such misconduct. Do M/s Modi & Shah believe they can fool all the people indefinitely?

Sakshi Maharaj’s latest rhetoric points to calculated mischief. As an MP from poll-bound UP he was well aware that the model code of conduct had come into effect, and consequently the apex court’s directives against seeking votes on religious, communal and caste basis were fully applicable.

That he was “testing the waters” is evident from his contention that he not specified Muslims, and that his speech was not made at a political event: in other words, beyond the ambit of the Election Commission. Clearly he was seeing how far the Election Commission could go.

The Meerut police duly registered a case and cited several violations of the law, the MP was actually taunting the cops to go further. For law and order being a state subject the police action could be projected as political action by the Samajwadi party government.

An arrest would make a political martyr of the MP, and prudence dictated that the police go slow — the UP cops would be aware of how Mamata Banerjee and the Trinamul had been going to town after the CBI arrested two MPs in connection with the Rose Valley chit-fund fiasco.

Those inimical to the BJP would suspect that with the demonetisation exercise possibly having negative electoral implications, the saffron brigade was resorting to its “polarisation” ploy — if for nothing more than “insurance”.