Terror Attack on SriLankan Cricket Team

Another horror story coming in from Pakistan. While some comments on telly were somber, at least 1 gentleman from establishment was blaming India stating something on the lines of "they are showing us what you can do in Mumbai we can do in here" (more here). I'd say an interesting though inadvertent admission they did something in Mumbai.
Even some comments from Pakistan on this attack from civil society blaming India. When will they get their head out of sand? If India were to attack, they'd have attacked the army or the government. What benefit will India get in harming Sri Lankan cricketers?
Its this state of denial that is Pakistan's biggest stumbling block in fighting terror. Until Pakistanis realize the enemy is within they wont be able to counter it. And they may realize it too late!
One of the telly channels had an interesting idea. They observed that were the Pakistani agencies complicit in the attack? Given that all assailants escaped and they showed visuals of Policemen handling weapons recovered from crime scene without gloves on. It was my own first thought on watching the news early in the day on CNN as it broke. Policeman picking up a pistol with naked hands and feeling it around. And my thought was now the only fingerprints would be of police investigators that they will get.
Its intriguing. What if the telly channel claim was true and the aim was to take the team hostage? i can imagine the grenade going under the bus, over it as 2 coincidences. The Pakistani team not traveling with them another co-incidence. Why so few policemen accompanying the team?
could it be that the aim was to kidnap the team and ask for Kasab's release in exchange? India would have been in a bind jeopardizing its relations with Sri Lanka if they refused and get a lot of bad publicity worldwide. If they acquiesced, a lot of case against Kasab and Pakistan would have been weakened. ISI should surely have loved that outcome!
While I confess its mostly conspiracy theory though not entirely straining credulity, its pretty much in a way what many in Pakistan seem to postulate what it comes to terror attacks in external countries blamed on Pakistani groups.What is really sad is that given the history of Pakistani establishment duplicity(especially the armed forces), this conspiracy theory might not be so far off the mark.

Why don't we still act

Yet another attack more vicious than before in Mumbai and we will hear the same platitudes. While the brave policemen are dying why don't we prosecute that clown who goes as our home minister for criminal dereliction of duty?
Its time the President sacks this government for failing to execute its prime duty of protecting the life and liberty of citizens. Heads of IB chief and those responsible for preventing such attacks should roll for such brazen incompetence.
28/11
IB needs a thorough revamp. Its top brasses should all be sacked for incompetence, not just the head. Same goes for RAW for if the attacks emanated from Pakistan, RAW should have been tracking it. The NSA needs to explain what was he doing all this time before being summarily dismissed.
Its easy to blame Pakistan and probably ISI did help these guys. But lets separate Pakistan from its army and more specifically ISI. If ISI indeed this play a part, we must now declare it a terrorist organisation and work to have other countries like USA/UK/France/China also do so. If that happens Pakistan army will be forced to disband ISI since well army only exists because US etc gives Pakistan huge aid and arm which the army corners.
Everytime there are attacks and same old platitudes by those who matter. Its time we see some very tough action. And if Manmohan Singh is not courageous enough to act, let him be dismissed too.
The NSG always airlifts from Delhi? Why cant super important cities like Mumbai/Chennai can't have permanent NSG units? Why did NSG come so late? I remember watching a Discovery/nat Geo program on an earlier plane hijack where the local police (and it was a very well trained Punjab police then) wanted to storm the plane but were asked not too since NSG is the units trained to handle such situations. And it took 3 hours for NSG to come to Amritsar where the plane was parked. Meanwhile the hijackers forced the plane to leave which eventually landed in Afganistan and India release many terrorists in ransom. And the NSA in charge then who took these insane decision one Mr Brijesh Mishra never had to answer for his idiocy and went on being a celebrated think tank for BJP!
Apparently we have not learnt those lessons as yet as we never do because our rulers are kings ruling by divine right and they can never be wrong. At this rate though sooner or later patience will break and people will take justice in their own hands ala the movie Wednessday. The clown going as the home minister and his minders are apparently great scholars. They do well to revise their history of French revolution for if the public patience breaks, that'll what it be and he and his minders the Mary Antoinette.

Maybe this time they will investigate

Jaipur was hit by serial blasts. An event that would have shook the nation wildly but for the fact that its become a regular occurring event. All politicians are playing the blame game. States blame center, center blames states, BJP blames Congress, Congress blames BJP and people will die on.
Meanwhile our VIPs will continue playing the give me more security game. The status of a VIP is rated by how many security personnel they have. A lowly one gets like 18! policemen, higher ones may get more than 100! How does sheer number helps doesn't make itself clear to me but apparently the Kings know it so they keep increasing their security detail numbers while blaming lack of policemen for crime investigation and prevention.
After all the government will get time to pay attention to citizen deaths once the ministers get time from writing letters to other ministries to corner government largess for the family, or after settling the burning issues of cricket. It seems every state's cricket body is headed by a minister or erstwhile minister. J&K has Farrukh Abdullah, Bihar has Laloo, Sharad Pawar is the head of BCCI.
But there may be a silver lining here. Today's TOI mentioned that many Australian cricketers were planning to return back post the blasts. That'll deal a blow to T20 which is cricket's latest money spinner. We know that politicos in India care only for money and cricket. So it might be a double whammy for them. This might just about make them try and work on prevention of such activities, at least in places important to cricket.
We can dream.

Indian War of Independence - Unfinished Business

My maternal grandfather, a M.Sc in chemistry in times when someone who passed 10th class in India was considered highly educated, did not join the industry as some hotshot. While manufacturing ink and chalk to sustain family, fought the British masters for Indian independence, went to jail, hid leaders at his places during times of British crackdown and then when Independence was achieved, gave up all, not using his friends in freedom struggle now big shot in Delhi politics, back to a simple family life. The struggle he maintained was for freedom, of mind, body and soul and not for being rulers of self. So once achieved he shunned all trappings of politics, not even to the extent of registering as freedom fighter which on those state controlled times would have made government jobs for his successors easy.
Turns out he was wrong. There was a time when clubs had signs - "Dogs and Indians not allowed in". The sign are back up these days. "Dogs and North Indians not allowed" or "Dogs and (Kashmiri) Muslims not allowed" or Dogs and Northeast Indians not allowed" Or "Dogs and Kannadigas not allowed" or Dogs" and "Tamilians not allowed" depending on which part of India you are in. We have changed one set of "rulers" for another.
Did Tilak fight for Independence of Pune only? Did Gandhi gave up his lawyer practice, endure hardships for independence of Porbandar only? When Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev put the noose on their neck singing "Desire of sacrificing our lives is in our hearts, /Let us see how strong are the biceps of the murderer." Did they die just for Punjab? I guess not. We spent 1500 years in slavery because we never stood up as a nation against foes. It was either caste or region or a village which was the max we were willing to look after and paid the price.
Today when Raj Thakre and his ilk preach such narrow bigotry, they are playing the same game that rulers in India played earlier inviting foreign invaders to come in and attack the neighboring kingdom so that they can annex it once the invaders go back home. Pity they never went back home. And its not just this Thakre who is committing what for me is treason. There are many.
That Kashmiri student in train who told me that how can he think fondly of India when his classmates in the engineering college call him a Pakistani just because he is a Muslim and from Kashmir which has a separatist movement? Or Tamilians beaten in Karnataka and Kannadigas beaten in TamilNadu when Kaveri issue flares? Or the Biharis killed in Assam and the Assemese woman dragged from a train and raped in Bihar in retaliation? How can we call ourselves a nation when such brazen acts of hate crimes take place and nothing happens?
Why are leaders calling for hate crimes against fellow Indians from a different group not tried for sedition and treason with its full impact?
We need another war of independence. This time from bigotry and hate. We shed blood to get rid of British. We need to shed more blood to get rid of our prejudices

Thoughts at the begining of the Year.

What a week. First we have the the party with less than 4% of popular votes holding up the nuclear deal, subverting critical reforms in pension, insurance sector in parliament, perpetuating violence on citizens of their own state (see Red cadres beat central forces ) for over 6 months now. Many peaceful protesters at Kolkata Film festivals were arrested, following which the 'intellectuals of the city then heart warmingly stormed the police headquarters and freed them all. The first act was legal, the 2nd (technically) not. The first act saw arrests, the 2nd will not.
On the other hand we have the UP government which gave up on key reforms on agricultural sectors after some protests that turned midly violent and which ironically forced spectators entering a cricket match between India and Pakistan in Kanpur to remove any black items of clothing including socks! Apparently this was to prevent any black cloth waving as a sign of protest during the match, protest against the UP government. So peaceful protest (assuming there were such plans - none that i heard of) is banned but if you are violent the government will be willing to harm 600 million poor farmers to save 10 million of you - just remember looting and arson are your friends in Indian politics.
Witness what happened in Gujrat and the number of orchestrators punished as yet ( no I am not talking of low level arsonists here but the planners)? Think how many of 1984 riots have been punished? How many of Mumbai train blast, Hyderabad bomb blast, Coimbatore blast perpetrators have been brought to book? What about the Kashmir victims? The victims in Northeast?
I recently read about the stories that won the Ramnath Goenka awards for journalism 2006. Some of the pieces coupled with my own observations recounted above and earlier posts are frighteningly leading me to conclusion that the nation of Gandhi actually listens to only violence which the political classes and executive reward while peaceful protesters are arrested, raped, killed.
I remember a friend who was in one of India's top civil services resigning and leaving for abroad. What he said than was that we Indians are a nation of the savage. I then thought that it was the reaction of a poetical mind to harsh realities. As I am realizing now, he just had seen much more of the system.
Its a sombre thought to start the Indian new year.

Updated 16 Nov 2007 : In the end all are equally bad. I agreed with Budhadeb's argument that population must move away from agriculture into industry. To that extent what happened in Nandigram (West Bengal) - probably a legitimate protest against land being acquired too cheap was turned by politicians into a movement against industrialization.
Instead of explaining to people why industrialization is necessary the ruling party decided to send its armed cadres to kill the opposition - not the argument, but the arguer itself! And the CM justifies the killing saying that its fair to retaliate against opposition! How is this different from the argument toted out for the Gujrat riots which we all condemn none so harsh as the left. How is it different from argument of terrorists - someone harmed me/my faith so i'll kill the next school gathering?
And how can a ruling party send its own people to "rescue" a locality and ask police to sit out for weeks while people are killed/maimed/raped? No doubt both sides of the divide were armed but how can the 'state' sit out? And if it does, how can one not then understand groups who say to hell with the state - lets get on our own and if it means killing few or many its OK. Is it not the same argument that the CM is making?

Is India relevant for Indians

I have often wondered what makes us so full or road rage, so ready to slash and burn at the slightest opportunity when in a mob. The key thing is that we do so when we are in a group. While I have no answers I will make a guess!
I think its the 'system'. It makes people feel so impotent in normal life that given an vent, they all erupt. Look at our government offices. A visit to any is a soul wrenching experience. Pan stains on walls, rude staff. It does not matter to the clerk (or the corner constable of police - the lowest rung) that the person he is talking as if the other is some lowly life form is probably talented enough to be his boss' boss' boss had he or she wanted.
It does not matter that the staff gets his salary from what the visitor pay as taxes. In short, the 'babudom' makes citizens feel 2nd class. We are a flawed democracy. so given an oppurtunity we descent into mobocracy. Common man knows that he can't really fight against the system and win. For the simple fact that given everything else, it will take 15 years for the court process to end. Who wants to spent 15 best years of life in courts? This leads to apathy and that in itself is a root of many ills.
Now I understand that any solution short of a revolution will be tough to get. After all in order to reform babudom and politics, the initiative will have to come from the top as well. But the top has lot more to loose in reforms than the bottom. Power is the most powerful aphrodisiac.
Courts in India are perceived to be free. But then even if free, in order to fight the system in courts you need a powerful prosecution arm. But the police have probably the worst public image among all government arms. And the reason are not hard to see. Just observe how a policeman (any policeman) talks to a common man - alone on a street. It will give you an impression of a ruler to a serf. But thats only the tip. Its a reflection merely of an institutional behaviour. What is our conviction rate? How many perpetrator of high visibility terrorist acts have been punished. When they have been - the top rung is almost entirely never caught, the middle and lower run get convicted in like 15 years. And as a recent columnist in Outlook pointed out, that too happens only when a Hindu- Muslim thing happens!
Take the well publicized case of a son of an IAS officer in Central government being killed. The accused are some family members of a sitting Member of Parliament. The case is dragging on for so many years. This when the person killed has a family who is a member of the power elite. If the accused are guilty the family of the dead has been denied justice as yet. If the accused are not, they have been denied justice for so long, living under shadow.
If such a high profile, under the media glare, case takes over 10 years to come to a logical conclusion just image what happens when a common man is involved. Assuming the police investigate with talent and impartiality ( both of which at least in public perception are extremely rare) it will still be longer than a decade wait! So the common man looses faith.
This is probably why terrorism is spreading roots. Why Naxalites are gaining control over such a large portion of India. Because for so many people the state has ceased to exist. When that happens what stops a person from defying the state? While I hate civilians being harmed (that is after all the definition of terrorism) for those which no help from state in defending life and liberty, it will cease to matter. And that is what seems to be happening.
An attack on police will cease to awaken people because for them its merely an armed wing of a state that just extorts taxes from them and does nothing in return except oppression.
Its a danger sign and we stop to look at it thinking that the problem will go away. The only way to fight this menace is by making state relevant. Improve the police, improve the governance. Make people proud of being an Indian. I once read that when US celebrates its 4th of July- the citizens celebrate not the state. In India, its the state that celebrates and not the citizens. If we are to stay as a nation, we have to correct this.

Nuke deal: Nuked or Left?

What a comedy over the Nuke deal! For once MM showed spine and said take the deal or withdraw support. Three cheers to Dr for finally choosing national interest over politics.
Left meanwhile makes its issue clear. They claim its both the deal and the strategic tie up with the USA that they resent. Strategic tie up with a 'democratic' sole super power is bad? lets face it, we've been beggars most of our modern life. finally that we are waking up to potential it makes sense to make ties. Its time we realize that a nation is truly independent only when it feed all its citizen, ensure full life and liberty and is powerful enough to stand up to any nation militarily and economically. We can harp on non-alignment for all we want but who gives a hoot to it? Do we matter to any nation. Heck we can't even fix a small nation on our side and we dream of being leaders of the world.

I won't be surprised if left is getting instructions on this from China. After all the nation that lays claim to a fair bit of our territory, is most steadfast ally of the nation that has make death by thousand cuts of India its raison de etre, and aims to be the power in Asia has genuine reasons to fear India and USA coming closer. Left being a client party of China CPA may actually have got word to oppose it on this big an issue.

BJP is of course opposing it while the deal that they were negotiating had much less to India (Talbot in his book mentions that Jaswant was willing to sign CBDT to get the deal), but in India opposition is not about working for interest of India if government goes wrong. Its about power even at the cost of India and Indians. But i wonder a mid term poll is such a good idea for BJP. They are in a hopeless disarray and their recent acts will make any rational Indian wince at the thought of voting them back to power.

Pity that Karan Thapar on CNBC made such a hash of interviewing Sitaram Yechuri. for once I agreed with S Y that Karan came with an agenda and tried to impose it besides monopolizing conversation. He just made one good point of the agreement text circumventing a US law which SY said is denying India its rights. While I have strong views on SY's misrepresentations of reality, this encounter left SY with moral upper ground. Such a pity or was it a part of the agenda too?

One question I would like to ask Left is whats the net gain if we do not have this deal? We don't have uranium fuel to run our power reactors. While jingoistic pride leads one to say we are the leaders in fast breeder using thorium, I doubt. if thats true why ain't we generating more electricity? Exporting nuke reactors? Have more nuclear science university programs? As for weapons we probably have enough to deter any body.

What we might lack might be the delivery systems where a strategic tie up with US might help more. After all, Pakistan is imploding. Where we might need a triad of delivery system might be to deter China, not so much Pak. Of course given that, Left very conveniently is dead set against any strategic, military and technology tie up with USA and Israel the two countries that can actually help develop a reach capability (reach within the immediate and near neighborhood).

In this case the deal actually allows us to import fuel for our reactors. Which means that our own meager supply of Uranium is actually available for military purposes. This is an argument often quoted correctly by Nonproliferation ayatollahs and is essentially true. Left of course very conveniently forgets to comment on this. Currently we have a severe shortage of fuel for our reactors and hence have to eat into our military use reserves. The deal also allows us to build a strategic reserve of fuel for our reactors. Assuming that Left fears are true and USA does demand a recall after say a nuclear test by India. It has to buy out our reactors and fuel which means that the financial impact is less on India than on US.
Besides I doubt if India will really test anymore at least in near future. Even without the deal the cost of a fresh test will be steep, a percentage more or less after the deal ain't all that different. Besides an underlying assumption is the we need more nuclear weapons. Do we? Aren't say 50 bombs enough to deter any nuke power from nuking us? As for non nuke warfare which is what the world usually sees, having great allies helps in preventing war and helps in upgrade of military. Of course Left opposes military games with countries who can be our natural allies.

Is it really that far fetched if some smart congressmen tie up with BJP. lets face it, ideologically they are not too far apart. If Vajpayee is brought around, Advani, Narendra M marginalized, Both may gain. I'll say tie up for the next elections. that will give both 7 years. Eliminate left from Bengal (if they can't after Nandigram they are really too incompetent), Shiv Sena from Maharashtra, Mulayam from UP, Dev Gowda from Karnataka can all be gotten rid if we just allow the law to take its own course. and 7 years is long enough for law to take its own course. That leaves the two to slog out in subsequent elections on real issues.

History shows that Indians are their own worst enemies. Cong and BJP of course will not come together. And Left will ensure that any chances of India becoming a real important power are fizzled out at first opportunities. What the deal and its strategic implications give us is high technology, access to top civilian nuclear tech which is all the more important given the scarcity and politics of oil based economy. Our engineers may train with the best university world wide (in civilian tech areas), all of which is so important with future. The reason why left is so anti is because its coming from US.

They probably want us to sign space technology kind agreements with Papua New Guinea's to improve our capabilities. The sheer duplicity of left which opposes Indian nuclear progress which vehemently championing Iranian program is staggering. and to think we elected 59 of these folks to stab us in heart, back and eyes just proves we get what we deserve.
I fear that even if the crises blows over and there is some compromise put in place which it may given the lust for power in Delhi, our negotiators may have their hands severely weakened after all this visible circus. That may be the biggest loss of them all.

Straight talking politician

Chanced to tune into some Sahara Bombay TV channel and found Sanjay Nirupam being interviewed. Apparently Raj Thakre recently mentioned that if Bihari don't respect Marathis beat them up or something to that effect.
What I found refreshing in the interview was the candor with which the MP spoke on issues. Yes it is wrong to target people based on any identity. Yes all have a right to live.
This gentleman I found, and a first in a politician, did not skirt questions and was forthright. What I really liked was when he said to effect that when one Shilpa Shetty was told something that was deemed improper in a TV show the entire world media went up in arms against those who made those racist comments including in India while we in India are probably the most racist people of them all.
I totally agree.
There is so much identity based hate and violence in India, it is numbing. As Mr Nirupam said for how long will we keep considering ourselves only as a part of a small group while the race to advance the country to a glory place in world has to be fought. I have found this so obvious even in a highly educated place like Pune. Go to a peth (old market) area and you can make out that if you are from North India the attitude of people towards you is of contempt! And this for region that gave most freedom fighters, great musicians and poets and many in academia.
Heck in my own housing society "foreigners" are not allowed to be tenets. And this when half the owners themselves or a close family member live abroad half the time. By Mr Thakre's logic, should US sack all Maharastrians because Maharastrians believe that their own land should not have any outsider living?
This attitude is not just here, I use it because I live here and see it firsthand. I am sure it the same in most other provinces in India. MH which in many ways is a very progressive state still suffers such bigotry I shudder to think what happens in more conservative societies in India.
This kind of discrimination is so common in India that we do not even bother to take notice anymore. I have traveled abroad a few times but the amount of hostility that I have seen within India for people from different "stock" is way ahead of any country outside. Its sad to see the original melting pot so degenerated. I had hopes that once people start traveling abroad often they will imbibe some of the good values. But when I asked a young guy in my housing society why such rules - he was shocked by my questioning it. They are so immoral was the answer I got! Wonder why then Indians so pride on family members settled abroad. How can you be happy about someone who leaves glorious India and goes on to live in an "immoral" society?

Kabir

Browsing through a literature community, I got into a mood to read a bit of Kabir. Google- the wise sage of eworld threw up a Sikh religion site that has a nice writeup on him.
First time I realized that Kabir's verse are found in Guru Granth Sahib. That he preached his own flavor of religion (probably a wrong term here I guess it must be more of a spiritual tradition). This is something common to most early Indian philosophers, and most poetry then was lets face it, devotional and philosophical.
This should not have come as a surprize to me. Afterall the "dohas" that I had read in school were in spiritual tradition. Still its a matter of shame that our schools do not really teach the ecosystem that gives rise to such rich poetry. I read some couplets, had a teacher explain some of the meaning behind the words. Meaning behind the words, not the idea. It can be debated that should a school teach ideas or let the pupils think on their own.
Before you say of course - think. Consider the debate in some of the US about school boards trying to foist some 'creationist agenda' on schools. So maybe its not a bad to avoid what might be a spiritual idea being taught in school. So I think. Hmmm, maybe it IS a bad idea to teach this in school as a science. But history, literature often are an understanding of human lives. How can they be taught with honest unless you also discuss the motives behind the lives?
India with its glorious spiritual traditions, of masters who questioned the existing order and preached alternatives does not expose its kids to their past. Maybe that explains the bigotry that is creeping in. Most kids may not even know that we had thousands of years of great minds questioning the present and past and laying out a different future! That is the tragedy. Most Indians have an arrogant pride in their past little realizing that we are making sure its stays a past.