Will terror ever leave us?

Just a few lines.....

Will terror ever leave us?

Nope!

Why?

Because crime and punishment (made famous in this juxtaposition by Fyodor Dostoevsky) does not go hand in hand in India.

So when Barkha Dutt puts on her earnest face and equally earnest voice and plaintively asks "Will hanging Kasab and Malik end terror?"....I can answer that worldly wise journalist this way..."Give Kasab and Malik to the victims....then lets see who has the guts to spread terror!"

Each time we catch a terrorist, give him to the ones who have lost children and earning members....who have lost limbs and lie shattered like Humpty Dumpty, never to be put together again!!

I assure you, terror will end!

And lets PLEASE not talk of "the spirit of Indians who face terror bravely"....its shameless and speaks of cowardice!

There is no bravery in tolerating bombs on an innocent populace....it is the net result of fat, useless politicians with their useless agendas, the failure of the police which has fattened itself like leeches and who fail time and again, it is the failure of the largest nation in the world in terms of self respect!

Ab baar baar kya kahen....words cannot share the same platform as bombs....only ruthless action can!

Live with the bombs and flying shrapnel! They are here to stay! Live with the terrorists eating biryani in jails! Live with the taste of lost self respect (if someone comes in time and again to beat one up in one's own home and one does nothing, its a severe lack of self respect). Live with fear....and the name of God! He is the only one who might protect us! And while He's half heartedly saving us, He's also muttering "Bloody Indians!! When will you take up arms?? Lazy, gutless cowards!!! Geeta gyan bhi kis useless nation ko personally diya. Har baar janam lena padta hai in idiots ko bachane....non violence and fasts ke natak ne naak me dam kar diya hai. Abe, kabhi to uth ja ladne ke liye!! Aur PLEASE, baten karna band kar!!"

Nishi

PS: I've volunteered!! I will be the unpaid hangman for all the terrorists.....I will get my own rope and manage to string them up alone! Just call me anytime! I'll even take no travel allowance! No hotel accommodation! Will pay my way! Just call me!

We appall the world with our moral, physical, ethical weaknesses!

A few years back I had caught an Oprah Winfrey show where an eye catching woman, flashing diamonds, took the audience on a tour of her house. I still shudder to recall those images. That lady had a small dog and one of her loos was chock-a-block with small, black pellets. You guessed it…it was dried dog poo! Probably years old! And the rest of the interior matched that filth encrusted bathroom….things had gone so much out of hand that that woman came on the show and faced the disgust and horror of strangers to ask for professional aid in cleaning up herself and her home. I thought she should have burned down her house and started afresh!

Reminds me of Indians and India…we have let things get so much out of hand that we too have years of excreta jamming up all our systems and now look at each other and debate about what is to be done! The frailer ones decide to jump ship and emigrate…others just continue to exist in this unwholesome set up.

Nothing works here….and even when we are torn apart and blown up into bloody chunks, the survivors and onlookers debate!

If debates could replace action then we would be the most efficient people on the planet…the TV each day covers people from various fields…debating! Endless repetitions of what happened and why and how! What should be done, and can be done and how to do it!

Our politicians breast beat in public and apologise and…debate! What their party has done, and how and why they are superior to the other parties. And the only time their vacant eyes show steely determination, it is when they are direct contenders to the “kursi”….the rest of the time, they are on auto pilot. You can blow up their public to kingdom come and they would go about their business as if all was peachy perfect!

Its been a fortnight since the Indian public was ambushed and attacked, as it went about its business, by trained militants now proven beyond doubt to have come in from Pakistan …and we debate! Pranab Mukerji says that India will not tolerate any of this any longer. So what are we doing now? Aren’t we tolerating? And enduring? And what a fine message we are delivering to a world wide audience….come and kill us when you please and as you please and in as many innovative ways as you can dream up…and we will debate!

We are a scared nation who make public displays of lamenting and have the memories of goldfish…lasting precisely 5 seconds!

We are in deep, deep trouble.

Pakistan is showing far more fire and mettle….it will not give us Dawood. It will not send the ISI chief here although it is so very very sad about what went on here… where is the proof? All know about its policy towards terrorism…Pakistan has never been its advocate and will wipe out terrorism from the face of the earth….excuse their tiny training camps in their backyards….national security matters, you see!! Overlook the fact that Kasab is singing like a canary and spilling all the beans, in between calling out to his mother. Pakistan wants proof! And Pakistan always gets what it wants! So we aam Indians can like it or lump it! Life is unfair, get used to it!

We are going to get strafed again and we will catch a glimpse of hell on earth…the unluckier ones will get a bellyful of the terrorist might and in that aftermath too…we will debate!

We will continue to have no stomach for fights, and we will discuss fair play and dissuade the hotheads amongst us that anger never achieved anything, we will debate and backpedal and discuss terrorism till it feels like an old friend…and wait to be blown up again…so that we can again congregate and light candles and march and abuse our leaders and give vent to all the emotions that have no outlet ordinarily and wait again for some more bombs! After all we are a billion strong…can’t we spare a thousand odd countrymen every few months to some terrorist activity? Ha, ha..where is your sense of humour!

Circular paths! Retracing our steps over and over again! The sheer futility of life itself!

Whom can we call and where can we air the disgusting cesspool of our lives to get some professional help? Where is Oprah? Let us take her on a guided tour and show her the mockery we have made of our lives....let the audience gasp with loathing….who lives in homes like ours?

I feel a deep connection with that poor doctor who made it his business to check security in cabs and is now in police custody! He is trying to make a difference….he is fighting back. He realized that nothing would shake off our immense lethargy and inertia and tried to do his bit. Let the man off, for Christ’s sake and go catch some terrorists!

Aren’t we stereotypical bullies? All bullies are cowards…so we let other countries wallop us around and cringe! And when we catch someone weaker, don’t we just come into our own? Publicly lynching cycle thieves, dragging young boys, who wrote love letters behind tractors, beating up pregnant women who we suspect of petty theft, throwing people with children off trains and buses because they had no ticket, gouging out eyes of stray dogs and painting them with burning coal tar…..ah, then we are unstoppable! And how do we treat men who come and make mincemeat of us and our families, who machine gun us to the ground, who send us for months to hospitals, who orphan our kids and leave us with missing limbs?

We do nothing!
We debate!
We wait!
We make each other laughing stocks!
We appall the world with our moral, physical, ethical weaknesses!

Rabindranath Tagore had written a powerful poem which we had to memorise in school…

“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken in fragments by narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depths of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake!”

Where is that India ? Did it exist only in the minds of the patriots? Was it only a figment of their imagination?

I too have a prayer…

May the sleeping Indian awaken, Lord! And during his slumber, do not abandon him, O Lord!

Do not sit down and give up!

Got a mail from a thoughtful uncle who wants to post my writing on his blog and asked me what alias I would like to use. I told him to use my real name…the very idea of hiding seems abhorrent, I do no wrong. I do not go out and shoot down people in cold blood and dance over the dead! It’s a trifle late for me to pick up arms…and all the wishing in the world cannot change what is!

But I will keep writing. I can do nothing more….I am the accursed thinker. In another life, I may become a doer. I am the coal that burns, what use it is put to depends upon the others. The realm of thought is easily occupied by me….the world of action inhabited by the soldier raises many, many emotions in me. Makes me a mite envious too…he hears the call and marches off to do his duty with no fanfare.

I talk of the Armed Forces, I include all those in uniform who protect us….I encompass all those who don the uniform and when the time comes, do not retreat. The greater common good is what they see and can sacrifice this life so that others may live. I find it the most evolved expression of human thought! And I like paying off my debts…to acknowledge that I labour under such a great karmic debt leaves me agonized!

Peace comes to us at a cost. The financial one is the most easy to return…the moral one crushes me and makes me desperate to pay back in any way, however insignificant!

I should like it if there were some camps held where all interested were taught some basic life saving techniques. So that when next we come upon an injured person we do not look the other way merely because we feel useless and inadequate! I think to help another is an elemental quality present in all of us, the ones who walk away feel they cannot do anything. Otherwise when one comes upon a person with a shrapnel splinter in him, what does one do beside yelling and throwing up one’s hands up in the air? Maybe faint?

I think blood donation should become a part of our lives….one feels most worthy after giving up a pint.

And I really, really endorse military training for all of us…for a year. Nothing will kill off this shabby politics of division which our dear politicians practice on us so often and with such deadly results, faster. Riots are such an awful price to pay for hatred. When we perceive the enemy within we burn, loot, murder, torture, destroy trains, buses, buildings which are our own, for crying out loud!....and when the real enemy comes, see how everybody melts away! I would curse Mr. Thackeray when his subversive policies seemed to be working…do you now see what a charlatan he was? Killing off people so poor that they had to come looking for work away from home, leaving family behind and this Godawful man not only snatched the morsel from their mouth but beat them up too. Terrorised a man so weak! Working to sustain oneself and one’s family is a crime? Looking for work is a crime and one must pay for it with one’s life? This is what this insect taught! And he had followers!!

I pray that we have had our eyes well and truly opened and the next time some creep of a politician asks us to finish a community, we turn around and lynch him right there and relieve this earth of a worthless burden!

How have we all been so blind? And when the true enemy turns up, lo and behold! We are suddenly on our own…not a leader in sight, not even their rowdy henchmen to provide us with some back up! Just what happens to all these ‘maai ke laal’? I am so utterly disgusted with our leadership that I cannot find the energy or will to abuse them. I just want a responsible, sturdy character at the helm who does not wish to push us all collectively in the fire and watch gleefully as we leap about in the flames.

Who are all these fat guys on TV, talking nonsense…how come they represent me? I would not trust my dog in their safekeeping. What has happened? How did we go so wrong? How can they tell me to choose between criminals….it’s either them or then I don’t vote? How come politicians who have been seen by eyewitnesses to be involved in riots roam scot-free, stand for elections? Tell me, I am clueless and bewildered! I cannot park without getting a ticket…how do these guys survive after creating open mayhem in broad daylight? And I can’t get a tenant out of my house and that fellow doesn’t even pay rent? I wait 20 years to fight and finish a case! Where did the law of the land go? It seemed to have gone off with no forwarding address either! And why did we let it happen so easily?

I just hope to God that my fellow Indian will not give up and sit down…I hope he continues to rant and rage and organize and shows me which way to turn…right now I am thoroughly lost and the only thing which keeps me from giving in to utter panic is the hope that I am among my own who are a very determined lot right now!

Enough, enough, enough!

Hey, people! Let us throw in our lot with Israel . I have admired them forever. I read “The Diary Of Anne Frank” in school and it had appalled me even then. The Israelis know how to deal with terror and terrorists so effectively that they have no peers.

We are looking to the world for an ally….let Israel be our friend…that small, staunch country which has the memory of an elephant and the heart of a lion! And the iron will to defend itself that silences the continents….when Israel stands up in its defence, it sees nothing, hears no reason, tolerates no mediation…I think I see them very clearly today and like what I see. I want to be that strong, that unbending….I’ve had enough of sitting on the fence and looking up for succor and relief from the ‘developed nations’…..out with my begging bowl like a typical Third World country, my pride nonexistent, an unquestioning acceptance of all the verbal and physical blows that come my way! No honour, no hope…just a mangy cur with its tail between its legs!

Enough of this miserable existence…..of this dying in anonymity. Being held at knife point by terrorists who do not ambush me in some dark dingy alley but inside my own home!
Enough, enough, enough!

The enemy is who threatens the safety of me and my countrymen

Since I am baring my heart and soul and mind, let me go where angels fear to tread.

I wish I could see the enemy as Muslim…makes it easy to segregate and focus on someone. But I cannot. And I do not say this merely because I want to score brownie points. The time for me being diplomatic is long past.

When I ‘think’ Muslim, I come up with a bus driver who drove me as a 19 year old from Lucknow to what I believed was Fatehpur and which turned out after 5 gruelling hours to be the wrong hamlet. He saw my apprehension and made me sit in the long-ago emptied bus while he made the conductor make inquiries. Then he told me to stay put and made me sit on the front seat where he could keep an eye on me. We drove back to Lucknow, night falling fast. A youngster sat next and did what idiots that age do...he sang some miserable Hindi love songs and sat so close that I could smell his hair oil. The bus driver threw him off the bus and made a very elderly gentleman sit next to me, who coughed in my ear nonstop but it was infinitely more reassuring! The bus driver was Muslim…he wore the white skullcap and white kurta-pyjama. I can see him very clearly in my mind’s eye two decades later! He dropped me very close to my grandmother’s house with strict instructions to go straight home! He knew I was Hindu. I never thanked him in my relief and I know he most probably is dead as he was old then. I wish I could meet him. He believed himself responsible for a young girl who had strayed from home. That is a big debt which I lug around.

The second one who comes to mind is a colleague of my jijaji who was in the Indian Air Force. They were posted in Baroda and the communal riots were deadly. The colleague was Muslim and was asked to remove his name tag by friends. He was livid and did not do so. Baroda was burning…my jijaji would try and accompany him always. That Muslim was in the Armed Forces and it was enough!

When I think ‘muslim’, I am reminded of my son’s best pal in a former school...Ali. Ali and Sangram were inseparable. Ali’s mother fed Sangram so many times that I lost count. I know that if ever Sangram was in trouble and near them, they would enfold him like I would Ali! I have no doubt in my mind…these two even looked alike!

When I think “Muslim”, I see a gentle classmate Shahgoofta, I see another who would cry on my shoulder as she did not want to get married and the D-day was approaching fast. I remember the long talks and her desperation to study further.

In Mumbai, I was driven about by Khan for 4 months, a hotheaded fellow whom I clicked with instantly and we would chatter non-stop on the 3 hr long journeys. Now Khan is most opinionated and has something to say on every topic. He answered all my questions that I put to him with no hesitation…we discussed religion among many other topics. I would ask my husband to send me only Khan specially if I had to travel alone and return at night. I trust the guy.

I was in the 4th grade or maybe 5th, when I read about Abdul Hamid during our Hindi lessons…and since I had never heard of him, his story held me spellbound when the lesson finished with “woh veergathi ko prapt huay”, I cried. I wanted him to live and kill some more enemy soldiers. It never struck me that Abdul Hamid was Muslim…he was a true hero and he won the highest award there is for bravery. We would play act at home and march around yelling ‘Company Quarter Master Havildar Abdul Hamid ki Jai” for days after this lesson. And I still get gooseflesh when I narrate his story to my son.

The enemy for me is who threatens the safety of me and my countrymen. That is why I feel that we all need to do a stint in the army…all of us, for about a year. All this mistrust will vanish if we defend our country side by side. It will become a non issue…ask any fauji…his comrade is his comrade and the hell with religion and politics. When one faces enemy fire together, see how fast the non essentials fall away from lives!

The Terrorist-a Devil's creation

I have read ‘An open letter to a Terrorist’ that someone seething with indignation has written in The Mumbai Times. Writing does help greatly in getting rid of the roiling emotions felt. But the terrorist is not one who can be rescued…he is recruited by the very Devil himself. He has no soul, he is beyond the reach of us mortals. He marches to a beat he and his like can only hear…a drumbeat of hatred and venom. He knows and recognizes the darkness within him and can only connect to pain and fear. When he sees us he wants us to experience what he can unleash and when we lie before him with glazed eyes and torn bloody bits, something in him rejoices and celebrates. Do not make the mistake of seeing in him a human. Do not attribute human qualities to him. He is a scourge in human form. He wears a disguise. He is nothing but evil personified.

Can you shoot down an old bowed lady who walks with the support of her son’s shoulder? Worse still, can you shoot down that son? Can you fire upon a woman giving birth? Even animals spare the new born's of other species! Can you kill a father out on a stroll with his children? Can you kill a youth who has stars in his eyes? Can you kill the hopes of an entire family and leave them as mere shells? If you can do that and sleep at night and live with yourself and look at your face in the mirror each day, then you have begun to understand a terrorist, not before!

Recognise him for what he is. No negotiations, no pleas, no crying and begging for mercy…he becomes more powerful when we grovel at his feet. Talk to him in his own language…wipe out his father and mother and grandparents and children. Teach him the language of the bomb and the bullet also…that is the only tongue he understands and listens to. Destroy him. I do not want to share the same planet as him. He is God’s enemy.

Never underestimate him.

Never tolerate him.

Never redeem him.

Never listen when he talks.

Never spare him.

Pursue him to the ends of the earth, dig him out from his hiding holes, shoot him like a rabid, diseased animal. All those who shelter him, feed him and his cause and justify him need to go with him…they are the underlings of the devil too. They are the weak ones, too afraid to come out yet as guilty as sin. Wanting a foot in both worlds…finish them too. Let us not bury or cremate his body on our soil…put him on the border in no-man’s lie to rot under the sky….they destroy homes…let them find no resting place even in death.

It is laughable when we say he is a victim of society and that we made him. I had a man working for us, Sunder. Sunder is 4 feet 6 inches tall, illiterate, born of illiterate parents , married at 20 to a woman with a disabled right arm, father of 4 children who came one after the other and as a result, the younger two cannot walk. Sunder worked like a demon from morning till night six days a week. If anyone should have been a terrorist, it should have been him. Living in a hovel, never stood a chance from the day he was born. Worse he knows he is doomed. Slaving and just about managing to keep his family’s head above water. The day he falls ill and cannot work, his family is finished. Now Sunder prays, he believes in a God who has so far given him the life described. And if he does not spread the hopelessness he faces every waking hour, how can a terrorist justify himself?

If we picked up a gun each time we felt victimized and shot down others, how on earth would that help? Which one of us has not gone through at least one horrendous crisis in life? I do not see my friends or family shoot others for relaxation and to get rid of problems. I should think that would really cook our goose. Do not seek to forgive him, do not search for his humanity…he is beyond us. He belongs to the shadows and serves the Horned One. Let us not gather a terrorist to our bosom in the misbegotten hope that he is the prodigal son. And let us see the SOB with no blinkers on. If we see him as a man of religion, we may as well do what lemmings do…..jump en mass into the waters of some large enough water body and truly escape this world!

I have a dream for my India

Am writing about something very personal and close to my heart. We all have heard and seen the news and it has saddened us all. It has outraged me as it is no longer a terrorist attack but war. Pakistan has brought the war into our homes and we are still talking about a Hindu-Muslim divide. I believe we are standing on the brink of devastation with blind politicians and an illiterate populace which will see what is shown....we need to see the writing on the wall. Pakistan is at war with us. And we do not seem to realise the gravity of the situation. We send out our police to deal with a highly trained and brainwashed enemy...the three top cops just walked into bullets because they thought they were dealing with ordinary terrorists. Our lathi wielding, overweight police are no match. A case of letting the fox among chickens! What can the chickens do other than flutter and die amidst a lot of clucking!

Only our Armed Forces stand between us and disaster. And they are a taken for granted, ill equipped, demoralised lot. Perhaps they question their importance too. But I know that what saves me and mine is that 24 yr old boy from Haryana who is more afraid of being laughed at than he is of catching a bullet, the tall lad from Punjab who will do what his saab tells him, the diminutive Gorham who is bravery personified and their young idealistic officers who lead from the front. Why I say idealistic is that the Army offers nothing other than honour and duty...and the ones who respond to the call are the true patriots. There was a time we held patriots dear and acknowledged our debt to them...now idealism is another name for foolishness.

I remember the Kargil war and the unbelievable acts of bravery and raw courage it threw up....who can forget Capt. Batra's laughing bearded face and that immortal line "YEH DIL MANGE MORE!" And a 19 yr old Yogendra Singh Yadav with 3 bullets in him, climbing up a grueling 60 feet to reach and neutralize an enemy bunker and engage in combat…our only living PVC, Capt Vijayant Thapar whose farewell letter should be read by us aloud to our kids.... "I have no regrets...if I become a human again, I will again join the Army and fight for my nation....if you can, please come and see where the Army fought for your tomorrow....never forget the sacrifice of these men...Papa, you should feel proud....Live Life King Size!" He was all of 22. Capt Anuj Nayyar, whose heroism fuelled a movie and numerous TV serials…, this roll call of honour goes on and on. And it still brings forth tears from me…tears of pride and sorrow and personal loss. And a feeling that we cannot take these sacrifices for granted anymore. The least we can do is learn from them…our enemy has a face…it is not Muslim…it is Pakistan! Pakistanis do not see you and me as Hindu, Christian, Sikh, doctor, engineer, poet…we are their faceless enemy and to destroy us is the only game plan. Why can't we see what they have made so plain?

I will go and donate blood and I will be vigilant in public places. I vow to take note of abandoned stuff and report it…and I will sit up all night when I see my country under attack and hold my head in my hands when I see the dead, the dying and the injured…is it enough?

We should take a leaf out of Israel’s book…I am no politician nor am I interested in political correctness..What I see is that the world fried and baked and grilled the Jews…millions of them and NO ONE spoke up…no one saw anything! While smoke was billowing from the crematoriums and the stench of human flesh was all pervading, no one saw or heard or smelt anything…they were the unseen dead. So they decided that they had to take care of themselves and that history would never repeat itself for them again. How many of us will have to be dismembered, to die anonymously in battle without knowing that they were the enemy….how much more will we take…how much is enough…is a 100 dead and 200 injured less…tomorrow when the tally is 500 dead and 1000 injured, is it enough? When do we get up and say that one dead Indian is one too many! How many more of these endless, bloody harvests do we have to witness and endure?

There are mails which proudly declare that India has never invaded any country in her entire history…when will we circulate mails stating that we gouge out the eyes that look at India sideways and tear out limbs that rise against us! And when will our war-cry be "ENOUGH"…

When will we reach out for our golden future which lies just around the corner? I KNOW it does exist…I can Feel it! I can feel the throb of a mighty Indian awakening. There is so much of hope in me, I am a believer!

The question is when! When will my brethren see in each other an Indian! When will India become our motherland and not a 'developing' country one must flee from! When will our national anthem bring tears of pride in our eyes! When will a Raj Thackeray never dare verbalize his stinking politics for fear of a public lynching from his very own 'marathi manoos'! When will the politician become a patriot and a leader! When will we find ourselves!

I will end with some of my favorite martial quotes:-

Pain is temporary, pride is forever.

What doesn't kill you, strengthens you.
And its unofficial continuation…
What kills you, strengthens your mother!

Persistent defence, effective intimidation, battle we must when enemy is in sight.

Sarver Izzat o Iqbal
(Prestige and Honour Everywhere)

Balidanam veer lakshanam
Shastra se shakti.

My Israeli favorite:
In the place where the (tank) treads stop, there the border will be decided!

The hard we do today, the impossible we do tomorrow.

A personal favorite:
An army builds a nation.

No one wounds me with impunity.

He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot, will be victorious.

Sun Tzu, the famous Chinese General, said around 500 BC:

In peace prepare for war, in war prepare for peace. The art of war is of vital importance to the state. It is matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no circumstances can it be neglected.

If you know the enemy and know yourself, your victory will not stand in doubt; if you know Heaven and know Earth, you may make your victory complete.

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.

If fighting is sure to result in victory, then you must fight, even though the ruler forbid it; if fighting will not result is victory, then you must not fight, even at the ruler's bidding.
---------------------------------------

May we all find our hidden warrior
May we always stand up for what we believe in
May India always prevail.
JAI HIND, JAI HIND KI SENA!