India, May 18 -- This unfinished draft was prepared by late Balbir Punj a day before his passing on April 18. A month has now passed since his demise. In light of the recent arrest of Nida Khan in the alleged conversion case, which has once again brought the Nashik TCS matter into focus, the draft acquires renewed relevance

This column continues my earlier piece, "Predatory Jihadis on the Move: 'Secularists' Continue Denial Mode" (April 16). There, I had argued that sections of India's self-appointed secular intelligentsia have, for decades, functioned less as neutral guardians of constitutionalism and more as apologists for organised religious conversion networks, coercive mobilisation, and ideological radicalism. The Nashik TCS sexual ...