Thoughts on The Terror Strikes In India

  Photo Courtesy: BBC

Mumbai has been attacked. More than a hundred people are dead. Some of them are even foreign nationals. In times while India is going through such turbulences, I can not help saying a few things on my blog though my blog primarily deals with my works on photography.

 The most important point that must be noted is that an overwhelming majority of Indians do not care the least to unite and fight terror. All that matters to almost every Indian is his own individual interests and it does not matter to him if someone is a victim until of course he is somehow closely related to him.  A Punjabi does not give a damn to what happens at Bengal. A Keralite would hardly care if thousands in Bihar lack any kind of access to education. And a Bengali is not concerned of anything in the world until it is directly related to himself or his family. It is THIS mean tribal sentiment that is the greatest weakness of our country. And being concerned does not just mean sitting on the sofa and abominating terrorists. Being concerned means building communities, groups, and finally expanding them to powerful institutions in order to fight terror.

And the worst effect of this is that our politicians are exact replicas of our mindsets. Every government that has come into power have failed to protect India from such attacks. Mumbai has been attacked three times in the past eight years. Why? Why are our intelligence and the government in power so weak? The present government has repeatedly failed to protect the public from such terror attacks. And that does not alter the fact that even if BJP comes to power it will not be able to stop this. All our politicians are concerned of is petty political issues that serve their own interests. Raj Thackeray can not bear the fact that Biharis are taking all the jobs in Mumbai and leaving the Mumbai’s youth unemployed. But where is his LOVE and CARE for Mumbai in THESE times?

Our country seriously lacks leaders. And until we – the common men – decide to take strong steps to modify the Indian mindset, nothing is going to happen. But we are so headstrong in our selfish motives that we would NOT change if a few of our cities are not eradicated from the face of this earth by a few nuclear explosions. When terror strikes take place we panic, curse terrorists, wow on the concept of anti-terrorism, and shout our lungs out by screaming “Vande Mataram”. But when every thing is over, we forget all that had happened, and go back to our daily self-centred activities. And look at the unity we have in cricket and Bollywood. Such disgusting sloth!

And the worst thing about India is that whatever happens, the blame is always on Pakistan. It is true that whatever attacks take place, all evidences lead to the involvement of Pakistan. Both the Indian Intelligence and American Intelligence said that Pakistan was behind the blast at the Indian Embassy in Kabul. Barack Obama has said that the Pakistan-Afghanistan belt is the seat of terrorism. Evidences suggest that these terrorists presently terrorising Mumbai had come into the city by a boat from a mother ship which is Pakistani. Their SIM Cards are Pakistani. They talk like Pakistanis. But all of these are allegations that have not been proved concretely. Just because there was a Saudi Arabian among the terrorists who crashed planes on the Twin Towers, it does not mean that Saudi Arabia was behind it. Just because there was a Jamaican behind the London blasts, it does not mean that Jamaica was behind it. So it is not right, as well as vey risky, to always pin point at Pakistan. Pakistan is itself suffering from much internal turbulence. In tribal regions of Pakistan, the disturbances have gone up to such a level that certain tribal regions have gone out of the control of the Pakistani government. And it is feared that it is in those regions that terrorists are breeding. Now that does not mean that the Pakistani government is to be blamed for it. What is essential right now is that India and Pakistan has to STOP behaving like kids and focus on mutual cooperation for resolving these things. But every time there is an attack, the Indian government points its fingers at Pakistan. But then they step back for God-knows-what political reasons. This is NOT going to help.   

Another important thing that we and our government MUST understand is that it is not impossible for a cost guard to have been bribed by the terrorists for getting an easy entry inside Bombay. In a state of such an emergency we suddenly realise the importance of the profession of a fire fighter, of a policeman, and of a coast guard. And these are some of the lowest paid professions of this country. So why will not a poor Coast Guard take bribe of a few lakh Rupees? Will we gain anything by blaming him and sending him to the prison? It is time to take things seriously until we are able to hunt down the dens of these terrorists and eradicate them. If things go back to normal even after this incident at Mumbai is over, I fear nothing is going to happen and things will go out of control. By that time, it will be too late. Thousands will die every year and millions will be threatened. 

P.S - In order to have a good understanding of the present situations, do visit the following links:

1.  Suvro Sir's comment at Tanmoyda's blog, the link of which can be found at the list of my favourite blogs.
2. Link to an analysis on Indo-Pak relationship of Reuters:                                                               http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE4AQ65J20081127
   
3. Another analysis of Reuters on the vulnerability of Mumbai:                                                       http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE4AQ52120081127
4. Who could be behind the attacks?                                                                                                      http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUKTRE4AQ14Z20081127
5. BBC's analysis: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7752173.stm    
6. Listen to this oral description of one of the hostages:              http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7753000/7753957.stm