The Bharatiya Janata Party, thanks to its ideology – whether you call it Hindutva or cultural nationalism – started out as untouchable for almost all other political parties. However, in the second half of the 1990s, several factors helped it on its way to power. It diluted its ideology, it had as its leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee who had some secular credentials, people were fed up with the Congress-Janata parties and the BJP was 'a party with a difference'. Now, Vajpeyee is no longer active in politics, ideology remains diluted, people found the BJP to be a Congress with Hindutva pretensions. On top of this, the party apparently is projecting Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi as its future leader, a potential prime ministerial candidate. The result is, of its oldest allies, Janata Dal (United), is hinting at a possibility of severing their ties a la Naveen Patnaik. The question after the second round of Nitish Kumar-Narendra Modi spat is, whether the man from Gujarat has brought his party back to good old days of being a political hot potato. Or, is the allies who swear by some or the other version of secularism, are finally showing their true colours of opportunism and hypocrisy?