18 SOCIAL SCIENTIST issue. In the event, they are holding on to state government in Rajasthan by the skin of their teeth; in Himachal they have been wiped out; in Madhya Pardesh, the hard secularist line of Arjun Singh and Scindia has cut them to a remote second; in U.P., they have lost over forty seats, not to the 'soft saffron' line of Narsimha Rao but, again, to the hard secularist line of Mulayam Singh Yadav and, more generally, to a coalition of the wretched and the aspiring—that is, Dalits, Muslims, OBCs, concentrated mainly in those eastern and central sections of the state which have not been the beneficiaries of the Green Revolution. This, despite the fact that the Brahmin vote that shifted away from the Congress in eastern U.P. went to the BJP; that the BJP was able to retain its upper caste vote in Garhwal and Kumaon; and that it took even a substantial part of the Jat vote in the Western districts. The sharp decline of the Congress in U.P. has certainly contributed to BJP's share of the vote, but the 'masjid referendum* it has lost. Not only that! The electorate has rejected the 'soft saffron line* as well; it has shifted the agenda from communalism to social justice, and, in so doing, it has provisionally detached the politics of eastern U.P. from the Green Revolution belt of Western U.P. and Haryana, joining it up in stead with the Eastern zones of India: Bihar, Bengal, and to a lesser extent Orissa. This has, I think, far-reaching potentials for Dalit politics, OBC politics, JD politics, politics of the centrist parties generally, not to speak of IFF in Bihar and, in adjacent West Bengal, the Left Front. On the other hand, these outcomes and potentials have sent shock waves not only through BJP but also the Congress, certainly in U.P. but also M.P., where large realignments are under way. The secular forces have reason to take comfort from these outcomes and potentials. But, lest we take too much comfort, we should recall also that the BJP has taken not only two-thirds of the seats in the Delhi assembly but also larger number of seats as well as larger share of the votes in U.P. itself, than any other political party—by far! That Delhi i$ now ruled by BJP with an unassailable majority, while Bombay remains in Shiv Sena's juggernaut, should be a sobering thought for us all as we think of the financial and political nerve-centres of the country. In terms of the long-term dynamic, moreover, the cultural shifts toward the extreme Right that the RSS has been pursuing, with enormous resources at its disposal, remain in place, as do all those pressures which are impelling the ruling and middle classes to incline toward the formation of an authoritarian state and increasing involvement of the military and security agencies in civil affairs. There is reason to feel relief, even some gladness, but the present subduing of the parliamentary front of Indian fascism ought not make us believe that the balance of force has shifted in any deasive way.