"One cannot help but get the impression that Modi’s sympathy for those who were charred to death by anti-social elements at Godhra was held against him as a cardinal crime. An even more cardinal crime was that his government took prompt action and arrested and put on trial those who led or masterminded the Godhra killings. The fact that Modi did not try to underplay the seriousness of Godhra incident and condemned it as an example of anti-national activity made enemies of all those whose politics thrives on garnering the Muslim vote bank through inculcating a sense of permanent victimhood in such ways that even if Muslim criminals and terrorists are nabbed, they cry foul and dub it as an instance of anti-Muslim bias. It is the same mind-set that defends Kashmiri secessionists, guilty of unleashing ethnic cleansing of Hindus in the Valley but have never taken up the cause of Kashmiri Pandits, even though they were ousted from their homeland through violence and terror. The media tried bulldozing Modi into de-linking the post-Godhra riots and the Godhra incident but because he did not yield to that pressure, he was painted as a Hindu bigot."