The Seattle Times: Books:

"Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet and Beyond"
by Pankaj Mishra
Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
336 pp., $25

On Feb. 27, 2002, Hindu activists were returning from a pilgrimage to Ayodhya, the site Hindu nationalists claim marks the birthplace of the god Rama. A crowd of Muslims set fire to their train, killing 58. Hindu fundamentalists responded with a killing spree, raping, stabbing and burning alive 2,000 Muslims in Gujarat. The slaughter was ignored and at times aided by local authorities.

To justify the rampage, the chief minister of Gujarat quoted Isaac Newton: "Every action has an equal and opposite reaction."