Sanity egresses
In the aftermath of multiple blasts in Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi, within the last 2 months, Indian politicians and the mediascape have notched up the din on combating Terrorism with tougher terror laws. Even a catchy name has been assigned to the blasts that gels with the foot-tapping beats and motion graphics of News Networks. Operation BAD (Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi). The nifty acronym optimistically presumes that this might be the end of the operation since Delhi was bombed on the 13th of September.
The responsibility of the blasts was taken by a group that calls itself the Indian Mujahideen. In perverted displays of machismo, the group sent out emails to media networks and SMS messages to cops, minutes before the blasts, presaging the inevitable certainty of what was about to happen and taunting them to stop it if they could. Perhaps this was their idea of fair play and feeling invincible. Twenty one people were killed in Delhi that day.
When a bomb rips through a busy public place it kills without prejudice. It does not discriminate between a man, woman or a child, a believer or a kaffir, rich or poor, black, white, brown or yellow. It is unbiased as the harbinger of death and destruction to all those and that within its periphery. As it shamelessly robs its victims of life, it also rips through the social bonds they carry with their loved ones. Just like the barbarity of those who planted it and the truculence of a Government that vows revenge, a bomb is apathetic to that extended adjunct of its prey. These families and friends are left to deal with their psychological wounds on their own. Then there are those who are left maimed at the borders. A lost limb, a lost sense, shredded skin and a benumbed mind. These scars of trauma they carry for the rest of their lives.
While the bomb may be dispassionate in its devastation it is passionate in its agenda of terror. Its goal is to create a chain reaction of replication and like a monstrous life form it wants to reproduce and proliferate its children: Terror and Violence. Bang, Bang, Boom Boom. Like a parasite identifies its host, the bomb hunts for gudgeons with ideologies of hate and intolerance and we humans are so readily prone to it. In the name of Religion, in the name of Nationalism, in the name of Social Injustice we are so susceptible to become a mouthpiece and trigger for more violence as sanity egresses and madness takes over.
India is not new to bombs or violence. Neither is the rest of the subcontinent. We hold our terror attacks as abominable trophies of our victimhood. This victimhood is our misery and our trump card. We toss it around to demand sympathy or orchestrate revenge depending on exigent conveniences. There is no vision, only terror to be responded with more terror, only violence to be answered with more violence. Islamic Violence, Hindu Violence, Naxal Violence, Police Violence, Military Violence, Corporate Violence, Organized Violence, Unorganized Violence, Bang Bang, Boom Boom.
Anyone who's visited the subcontinent or lives here knows that daily life in the subcontinent is a violent experience. There is the violence of Poverty, the violence of Corruption, the violence of Progress, the violence against Women, the violence against Children and of course the violence against Minorities. Every group is first demarcated as a minority and then attacked. The non-Maharashtrian in Maharashtra, the Muslim in Gujarat, the Hindu in Kashmir, the Christian in Orrisa, the North-Easterner in Delhi, the Bihari out of Bihar, the tribal in the forest, the farmer in his village, the Artist by the Self-Righteous. It is hard to imagine that M.K Gandhi launched the world's most successful non-violent agitation in this land. Since he is the father of this nation, we can only be his bastard children.
There is ample evidence of this heinous malaise that has consumed India. The Indian Mujahideen sent this poster in their emails to news networks. Using two people's images begging for mercy against a mob of attackers in Gujarat, they proclaim, in the name of Justice, that an Eye for an Eye will be taken. Warning of Armageddon, they inform us that the dust will never settle.
In response, the BJP launched its election campaign in Karol Bagh, one of the blast affected areas in Delhi, accusing the government of being soft on terror. BJP's main spokesperson, Narinder Modi, who is presently the chief minister of Gujarat made this statement in the name of Justice, to a round of applause:
"An eye-for-an-eye, tit-for-tat - that’s the policy I believe in."
The Indian Mujahideen is peddling the sleaziest ideas of revenge and their appeal is to the basest instincts in human beings. But instead of addressing the root causes of terrorism, you know your country and social fabric is torn beyond repair when mainstream political parties start piddling the same language and respond with such gimcracks. We've hit rock bottom of society when we find identical words in both "Terrorist" and "National" propaganda.
