New Delhi, Sept. 4: Home minister Shivraj Patil is being pressured by his cabinet colleagues to act tough with the Orissa government and issue a directive under Article 355 to ensure that state is ruled “in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution”.

The directive is a step short of Article 356, which empowers the Centre to dismiss a state government if the constitutional machinery collapses.

Patil was non-committal about the demand, which came a day after his visit to the riot-scarred Kandhamal district. The home minister had described the situation there as “neither volatile nor normal”, but “something in-between”.

When the Union cabinet met this morning, minority affairs minister A.R. Antulay asked Patil what his statement meant. He also wanted to know if the administration and police were complicit in the attacks on Christians.

Antulay was joined by Vayalar Ravi, Kapil Sibal and Priya Ranjan Das Munshi. They said Patil should have taken a stronger stand and asked chief minister Naveen Patnaik to explain why Union minister of state for home Sriprakash Jaiswal was stopped from entering Kandhamal while the VHP’s Praveen Togadia was allowed free access.

The home minister said it was a battle over land and reservation rights between tribals and hinted that the violence had been instigated by “local” factors and did not have communal ramifications. But the cabinet members interrupted him, saying that would not lessen the role of the VHP and the Bajrang Dal.

Government sources said Patil’s relatively soft stand had taken them by surprise. More so after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had sent a stern message to the Orissa chief minister to get things under control.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi, too, has asked Orissa leaders to stage protests against the violence, forcibly enter affected areas and court arrest, if necessary.