Instead, he professed a love for Maharashtrian Muslims as part of his ‘apla manoos' (our man) theory and reserved his fire for Pakistan and those professing allegiance to it,” she writes.
“That was a remarkable toning down from the times when his anti-Muslim rhetoric had compelled some leading intellectuals, including noted scholar and a former minister in successive Congress governments in Maharashtra, Rafiq Zakaria, to lead a delegation to Matoshree in the dark of the night, soon after the Shiv Sena came to power in 1995.
“These intellectuals were worried that with the government now dancing to his tune, the minority community in the state would be sitting ducks and may not be left in peace to pick up the broken pieces of their life and move on and away from 1993.”
