Sunday, June 7, 2009

New Government - set expectations is bare minimum - provide us with security of being alive

The elections are over. We have our own government now. The UPA government. One can sit and think hard why BJP failed and Congress won. But this was expected keeping in view the recent turmoils in economy, socio-economy and insecurity amongst the population of India. The political Goverment of India has been trying to do something for us. But what exactly is intheir mind and when will it come to being into existence is yet to be seen.

The politicians, are hungry for power, and they have always adopted divisive policies to divide the majority community along caste and class lines, while at the same time, they concentrated on capturing the minority vote banks in bulk by cajoling their religious heads, whose directions are religiously followed and obeyed by the community. The successive pseudo-secular governments started suppressing the rights of the majority community, while giving undue privileges to the minorities. These governments allowed the minority communities to have separate personal and civil laws instead of ensuring a Uniform Civil Code despite directions from the Supreme Court based on Article 44 of the Constitution. The official machinery remained as mute spectator when the minority community took the law into its hands for protesting against the incidents, which happened even outside the country like ’ invasion of Iraq, hanging of Saddam Hussein, Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasrin’s book’s release and her stay in India, etc.

With the advent of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, an opportunistic alliance of minority appeasing pseudo-secular parties and Islamic terrorism has increased manifold. The situation has gone beyond control to such an extent that the ’jihadis’ have started striking at will in trains, buses, markets, malls, temples, mosques, theatres and even courts.

The annual report of the Union home ministry has confirmed the involvement of Pakistan in most of the terror attacks, which have happened on our soil. It is reported that the Pak based terror organisations like Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) have been active from across the border and have been involved in major attacks. Also, the Bangladesh based organisation Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami’s (HuJI) involvement has been on the increase, it is said. All these organisations have been sending well-trained militants to set up ’sleeper cells’ and to ensure connectivity with one another by forming a network of sorts.

The home ministry’s report claims that the government has banned 32 groups as terrorist organisations under the provisions of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, as part of its counter measures. The report has waxed eloquent on the government’s multi-pronged approach and strategy for countering the activities of Pakistan’s ISI and other terror outfits.

It claims that the Centre has increased strengthening of coastal security network, deployed para military forces in sensitive areas, heightened the vigil in and around vital installations and enhanced the communication network of intelligence agencies and sharing of intelligence between Centre and states through well coordinated efforts.

But the ground reality is totally contradicting the claims made by the ministry. In fact, the terrorists are active and effectively executing their attacks in Congress and Left ruled states like Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, West Bengal and Kerala, which goes to prove that the areas of appeasement are more prone to attack.

The new argument by certain new founded double speaking intellectuals, Pseudo Secularists and certain chronically politically biased English Media especially the TV channels based in New Delhi arguing that poverty and minority oppression by the so called “Hindu Majority” is the root cause of the terrorism in India.


Being a fellow citizen of this country, I find these arguments. baseless It is again just escapism to put the blame always on Hindu Majority. India remains one of the poorest countries in the world today.750 Million people are in utter poverty in this country. Does it mean that all of them are terrorists or they think adapting to terrorism can take away their poverty??


As regards the ‘phenomenal Hindustan specific’ Minority oppression, Look at Pakistan, A purely Islamic nation, today that country is flooded with terrorists and extremists. Bombs are exploded there and human lives are being lost everyday. Is it because of poverty? Is it because of so called ‘Minority oppression’ there? People should think about it.


Pakistan initiated the terrorism for political bargaining and they will end with it because it is now out of any one’s control. “Those who live with Sword would die with it” or else they have to understand themselves what went wrong and rectify those mistakes though the extremism there at its peak and deep rooted.


Contradictory, being purely a religious nation Malaysia is a good exemption why because the prosperity in that country and there development and national integrity comes first not the crooked politics.
The root cause of this terrorism is the dirty politics being played in respective countries for personal gains by certain section of politicians and their operational colleagues the religious-fundamentalists. The common men do not understand that it is just the family of politicians (It is called Dynasty politics) and their loyalists only gain by these kind of pseudo-secular agenda. This is a front-end & Back-end process. Front-end they create false agenda, then push the people to fight each other and shed tears for that cause, back-end they make use of such situation by harnessing votes of the victims, once back in power they forget them. The common men must understand it is not you their concern but how to retain power is the concern.


Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Terrorism- Code decoded

Dear Readers,

I am trying to simplify and make a coherent understanding of Terrorism. I wanted to know what guides them, motivates them, pushes them so much that they become vehement killers. I wanted to understand the psyche and morale of these human killers in the disguise of human.

Rebels, insurgents, paramilitaries, separatists, militants, guerrillas, insurrectionists, fundamentalists... are these all terrorists? Or does terrorism claim its own exclusive niche? The exasperating inability to define terrorism is betrayed in the UN 2006 Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy - "we, the States Members of the United Nations...strongly condemn terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, committed by whomever, wherever and for whatever purposes".

The vocabulary of terrorism has become the successor to that of anarchy and communism as the catch-all label of opprobrium, exploited accordingly by media and politicians.

The difficulty in constructing a definition which eliminates any just cause for terrorism is that history provides too many examples of organization and their leaders branded as terrorists . This has applied particularly to national liberation movements fighting colonial or oppressive regimes, engaging in violence within their own countries often as a last resort.

Bomb attacks on the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 followed by the 9/11 tragedy in 2001 marked the renationalisation of terror in which a populist and possibly negotiable cause within the nation state becomes subservient to principled grievances against the world order, communicated through the tools of globalization led by the internet. Both attacks in Africa were traced to the group headed by Osama bin Laden known as al-Qaeda. Its ideology is shaped by the belief that Islam is being degraded and humiliated by "western" values, with particular disgust reserved for those Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which are close allies of the US. The plight of the Palestinians is a rallying call for al-Qaeda whose central goal is to expel Americans from Muslim lands and dismantle pro-US Middle Eastern governments. To this end all US citizens and their sympathizers are to be killed, regardless of whether or not they are Muslim.

This extreme form of fundamentalist Sunni Islam adopted by bin Laden and his closest associates is often described as jihadism and is believed to have been inspired by an Egyptian radical, Sayyid Qutb, who opposed the Nasser regime. Fighting alongside the conservative Taliban in Afghanistan may have been a further influence on bin Laden. The manic ideology of al-Qaeda has no roots in mainstream Islam which shares core values of peace and tolerance with the world's major religions. The Koran teaches that the killing of innocent humans is a crime and that suicide is unacceptable.

Attempts have been made to construct psychological profiles with proven susceptibility to indoctrination. In Islamic countries such interest focuses on the sense of political impotence created by inadequate democracy and corrupt governance. In Europe, there are suggestions that young Muslims from immigrant families suffer identity problems in reconciling differences between western lifestyles and their upbringing. As yet these theories remain in the realms of speculation. Likewise, media tendencies to brand Pakistan as a source of world terror have been countered by a remarkable petition “Say no to Terrorism” which has been signed by over 60 million people in the country, more than the number of voters in the recent election.

Saturday, January 24, 2009

slumdog millionnaire - trivial insecurity

Well, you know ART has to be liberated and that’s what is the film makers prerogative to show as what he wants and its our prerogative to watch or not to watch/ appreciate what we want to see. 

I completely agree slumdog has shown India on poor light wherein every nation has the dark under the light but again, slum dog is not unreal too. These thing existed and we wanted to NOT to show it or to sweep it under the carpet through our bollywood cinema . Bollywood cinema is now about Indians who stay in new York and share an apartment with girls or may be Indian couple staying in LA and having extra marital affair and we think inwardly “ what great culture” we are portraying. Why people don’t object to cinema like                                                     dostana or kabhi khushi etc? 

The point is , I am also having the pinch in my heart for showing the gross side of slums in India , but , I am sure the world knows much more about India then we think they know. The world knows about Lakshmi Mittal , Ambanis , our growing economic power, n-deal , our millions on Software Engineers across world and Taj Mahal ? 

So,  whats the big deal if Danny Boyle wanted to show the poorer side of India? Let the artist have his freedom , I would say. Or may be we would not have commented if Karan Johar or Shyam Benegal had won the same awards for the same movie. Are we not getting little bitter because a foreign film maker made it and not an Indian? 

Why don’t you protest when Adiga won Booker award ? The white tiger equally talks about slums and poverty of India. No but we appreciate it as pure form of good literature. The same way, we can appreciate this movie too !

Then, we should not forget VS Naipol,  Arundhati Roy and Jhumpa Lahiri  who showed the bright side of our country and won booker award. 

Basically , the  audience are the same. They are intelligent. So lets not be insecure that someone is going to think of us as slums. Anyone and everyone knows the grandeur of India a lot to isolate our country as a dark country full of slums. 

I have faith in the audience. Are you thoughts with me?

Friday, January 16, 2009

The darkness under the light.

Dear Reader,
Is been almost 2 months now from the day of attack which shook our country and our sense of security. 2 Blasts followed in Assam and which was given quarter Page media coverage for just a day.

I called up few people I know in Assam and asked how are they doing? Is there is actions from Government? Frankly they seem to answer in vague " arre.. yeh sab chalta rehega, kya karega Govt ? zinda hai, bahot hai ..blasts to aksar ho rehe hai .....".

I was pondering and disappointed. Is this how a citizen should behave? Why they sounded so resigned and given to what was happening around? Why was such hopeless helpless pessimistic outlook towards state govt?

I also wondered , what is the terrorists getting out of the whole thing? Their basic weapon to "terrorise" people is no longer working in Assam as people are not terrified anymore. Not that they are brave and preparing for retaliation, but then continuous attacks have kind of vaccinated them of terrorism. So none raises an eyebrow while blasts happen. People have resigned to accept that they have no security , no system to rely on. Hopeless system!

This system is not just the govt but also all those people who have decided to shut blind eye and let them suffer to the fate. This situation is dark and doomed. In one hand it will mean terrorists know Assam people wont react and on the other hand Govt will not be taking any visible strong action. The situation will remain as is for time to come. Who can you blame with pointed finger when the whole lot is to blame, some circumstantial and some objective figures to take up the blame.

"India shining " - And just under the light there is so much darkness that one cant even see where the country is heading to.

And this shine has blinded our Govt and think tanks that they are not bothered about the darkness and the evil forces lurking in the corner. Ready to strike once again, we ready to die once again..... !
( I know all these sounds pessimistic but I think we lost that spark which ignited just after 26/11. Media isn't covering it anymore, the news has become stale and just another historical event. People don't discuss as this has been debated enough. And here I am , still my heart goes out to the 200 odd families who lost someone in the Taj/Trident/CST , for them the loss cannot be repaired. They had hope of justice, which alas , due to the "Shining Indian Govt" looks bleak.

Lets open our eyes to our blindness . Lets not give up.

Are you there with me? Help me to keep this awareness alive in our heart.

Friday, January 2, 2009

2009 starts with a bang !

Here's wishing my dear reader a very peaceful 2009.
I would have wished you happiness, money, success but I feel peace can supersede all other intrinsic feeling now more than any flow of mind.

How nice would it be to wake up, sip coffee and read headlines " Terrorism finally eradicated from world- all nations stands united ." ---- A very wishful thinking indeed. isn't it?

No, 2009 started with 5 serial blasts in my birth state dear Assam killing 5 people and leaving 22 odd injured. What a super way to start new year ! I couldn't believe they have again maintained their stance in terrorism and they are doing their destructive tasks as any old long timer enemy would do as they have understood the fallacy of the system and they give a damn to it !

Yes, for north eastern people it has become a part and parcel of life.. u never know if u would return home safe and sound and in a whole body with limbs intact. They have long forsaken the system and lost hope that anyone would do anything about it.

And who knows better than a north eastern ?

I would sincerely pray that the Govt would soon wake up, stir from the doomed sleep and do something. what more is needed? Do they need the terrorism to be successful and have more people killed? the beginning of the new year isn't good at all. I also feel the NSG should have a very strong base camp in Assam as not only the state is disturbed but also serves as a gateway of anti social elements to enter India through the weakly protected borders.

The upcoming election is an important one. If you are reading my blog and realise even 1 % of my intention to pen down these, please vote for the right party. This time dont shrug off from your duty.

My resolution for new year: Be a more responsible and alert citizen. Not to take India for granted. And not to let terrorism take India for granted.

Are you there with me in my thoughts?