An intriguing parallel leapt up while scouring news reports and obituaries relating to Martin McGuinness, the Sinn Fein and Irish Republican Army (IRA) stalwart who died last week. It turns out that the teenage McGuinness was propelled into activism, and subsequently violence, upon seeing pictures of a blood-splattered Gerry Fitt after the Catholic MP for West Belfast had been set upon by the Ulster constabulary during a civil rights march in 1968.

Forty years earlier, a similarly minded police hierarchy, owing allegiance to the same monarchy, had viciously assaulted a peaceful protest in Lahore against the colonial Simon Commission, which had been set up to determine the vast colony’s fate without any Indian representation. The most prominent casualty was Lala Lajpat Rai, who was singled out for personal attention by the local superintendent of police James Scott.

Possibly as a consequence of the assault he suffered, Lajpat Rai succumbed to a heart attack less than three weeks later. Many Indians were inevitably incensed. A few were determined to exact retribution. Among them was the young firebrand Bhagat Singh, the anniversary of whose consequent execution was commemorated on March 23.

The parallels cannot be stretched too far, but both McGuinness and Singh tend to be viewed as terrorists by some and as freedom fighters by many others, and both of them perceived British colonialism as the primary foe. Unlike Singh, McGuinness did not become a martyr to the cause but evolved into a peacemaker, serving for almost a decade as Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister and befriending former adversaries without ever abandoning his aspiration for a united Ireland.

Among the atrocities McGuinness is claimed to have masterminded during his stint with the IRA was the brutal assassination of India’s last viceroy, Lord Mountbatten — although the latter’s niece, Queen Elizabeth II, evidently had no compunctions about grasping McGuinness’s hand.

Others are less forgiving, and the IRA’s terrorist campaign on the British mainland through the 1970s and ’80s is often cited as evidence of how the natives are perfectly capable of keeping calm and carrying on in the face of random violence.

There were plenty of signs of panic, though, in the wake of the appalling incident in London, when 52-year-old Khalid Masood ran over pedestrians on Westminster Bridge and stabbed a policeman to death. It was a despicable crime, and whatever mind-boggling reasoning there might have been behind it remains shrouded in mystery.

There is plenty of circumstantial evidence, though, pointing to some kind of jihadist intent. The perpetrator, who was shot dead, was a recent convert to Islam who had spent several years working in Saudi Arabia as a teacher. Before that he had served several stints in prison for violent assaults. Apart from his age, he broadly fits a pattern witnessed on the other side of the English Channel.

Nonetheless, albeit deeply tragic, the consequences of his actions could have been much worse. Imagine a vehicle larger than a four-wheel drive. Or weaponry more lethal than a kitchen knife. And, while Mr Masood’s dastardly attack is undoubtedly a reminder of how easily an individual with malicious intent can unleash such violence, it’s worth noting that such acts, hard as they are to predict or forestall — although police in Antwerp apparently thwarted a potentially lethal driver the day after the Westminster outrage — are hardly commonplace.

The Islamic State was quick to claim credit for the atrocity, but British police and intelligence services have not found evidence of connections between Mr Masood and any jihadist outfit. They believe he acted alone, and his motivations remain a matter of conjecture. The last mass casualty attack in London was the horrendous suicide bombings of July 7, 2005. Compared with the IRA’s campaign a few decades earlier, that’s a gratifyingly long interval between outbreaks of terrorist violence.

This redounds to the credit of the security services to some extent, but also points to the weakness of IS, Al Qaeda and related branches . What possible purpose can be served, though, by elevating crimes such as Mr Masood’s to the stature of an “attack on democracy”? To spread fear by exaggerating the threat? And, if only inadvertently, to encourage similarly deranged copycat actions?

The patent absurdity of Islamist zeal contrasts with the motivations of the IRA — and for that matter Bhagat Singh’s Hindustan Socialist Republican Association — whose aims could be embraced without condoning its abhorrent tactics.

By arrangement with Dawn