Innocence and the miraculous somehow go together. Take away one and the other wilts and fades. Along with receding innocence goes youth. And this can happen at any biological age. You can have 12-year-old ravagees with “tombstones in their eyes” and 90-year-olds with their impish inner-child intact. Applied to the akhara of Indian politics, and indeed the international political landscape in all its varied hues, innocence would probably transform into idealism. And idealism is definitely in short supply in today’s world.