AHMADABAD, India (AP) -- Sitting on his shop's metal cashbox, amid stacks of books on Islam, prayer caps, and towers of velvety smooth Quran cases, Mohammed Gula will tell you why mobs are not stalking the streets of this city.
He saw them in February, when a Muslim mob attacked a train filled with Hindu activists, killing 59 people and igniting sectarian riots that flared for weeks in Ahmadabad and other cities and towns across the western state of Gujarat. At least 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.
So when terrorists charged into a crowded Hindu temple complex last week in the nearby town of Gandhinagar, spraying gunfire that killed 31 people and left pools of blood that were still being mopped up days later, the response was immediate: shops slammed closed, people raced home, neighborhoods emptied as Muslims sought shelter in areas they hoped would be safe.
But across Gujarat, there was little violence. The reason, many say here, is pure politics.
``The government doesn't want there to be violence now,'' said Gula, who sells Muslim religious materials. ``If the government wanted it to happen, it would have happened Tuesday at 5 o'clock,'' fifteen minutes after the temple siege began.
``The government understands that if they allow the riots to happen again, they'll be even more disgraced all over the world,'' he said.
Muslims, Hindus, politicians, rights activists -- most everyone here sees some sort of link between violence and politics. And if things were peaceful in Gujarat this week, they say, it's only because the politicians didn't want violence. Not this time.
``It shows the extent of organization of the Hindu right in my mind,'' said Smita Narula, senior South Asia researcher for Human Rights Watch.
The New York-based organization issued a scathing report earlier this year accusing Gujarat's politicians and security forces of helping organize anti-Muslim attacks.
But Narula praised the Indian and Gujarati government for moving quickly and keeping fighting under control last week. Narula noted that: ``There was plenty of political capital to be gained from the last round of violence.''
There are a wealth of such allegations -- the country's National Human Rights Commission and other rights groups leveled similar charges -- but India's ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, which also governs Gujarat, has repeatedly denied encouraging the violence.
BJP supporters have turned the accusations back on their opponents, saying the secularist, opposition Congress party was behind some of the earlier riots, nursing the fighting in an attempt to discredit the ruling party and break up their coalition government.
Government officials, for their part, say their reactions this time were simply an effort to stop Gujarat from exploding.
Certainly, though, the ruling government has made at least some political gains in Gujarat this year -- both in frightened voters drawn to them by the earlier violence and in their success in showing control after the recent attack.
Modi went on television urging calm, as did national leaders. Thousands of soldiers were deployed to the state. And the police, widely seen in many towns, including Ahmadabad, as abetting the earlier riots, moved quickly into the streets.
``Clear instructions were made to the rank and file to not allow anyone to indulge in violence -- to deal with them firmly,'' said Additional Commissioner Satish Verma, one of a number of new top police officials brought in since the earlier rioting. ``The police meant business.''
There were significant differences between the February violence and what happened last week. Perhaps most importantly, while the train was attacked by a Muslim mob, the temple siege was committed by just two men -- eventually killed by commandos -- who some Indian officials later said were tied to Pakistan. Even to the most ardent Hindu militants, there seemed less of a reason to turn on their Muslim neighbors. Pakistan denies aiding the temple terrorists.
Violence between Hindus and Muslims can be traced back for centuries in India. But the modern enmity was born in 1947, when Britain granted independence to its colony and some 200,000 people died in communal clashes when the nation was divided into Pakistan and India. Today, Muslims make up slightly more than 10 percent of the population of India.
Since then, the two religious communities have shared a sometimes-difficult, but also deeply complex, relationship within India. For every example of anti-Muslim violence, one can find Muslims sitting on India's top courts, in its military leadership, and starring in the biggest movies in this film-crazed nation.
Gandhinagar, where the temple attack took place, is named for Mohandas Gandhi, the hero of nonviolence and Indian independence who remains a beloved figure to both faiths. A Hindu, Gandhi was murdered by Hindu militants who resented his defense of India's Muslims.
But today, even among some proponents of nonviolence, there are quiet ripples of anger.
``Killing is wrong, definitely,'' said Sadhu Vivekjivandas, a Hindu monk who belongs to the Swaminarayan sect that built the Akshardam Temple complex.
But he also believes the rioting earlier this year, which began when Hindus were burned alive in a train in the town of Godhra, has been misunderstood.
``Nobody talks about Godhra, they only talk about the post-Godhra effects,'' he said. ``One must understand the oppression Hindus are going through.''