Terror – struck

The inability of the Indian state to protect its citizens has been all too apparent over the past ten years, all this after being in the cross hairs of terrorist activities and losing more people to it annually than any other country, save maybe Iraq. The glum reminder is that the nation will continue to be at risk, as there is a lack of competence in the leadership.

Late Mr. Sadanand A. Shetty, Founder Editor
(October 9th, 1930 – February 23rd, 2007)

“I speak out because I am a citizen. I think the Weimar Republic collapsed and the Nazis took over in 1933 because there were not enough citizens. That’s the lesson I have learned. Citizens cannot leave politics just to politicians.”
– Gunther Grass

They came from the sea, in the darkness of a November night, on a rubber dinghy that landed them at the southern tip of Mumbai. Ten young men of exceptional ‘bravery’ armed with Russian assault rifles, Austrian pistols, Chinese grenades, weighed by RDX and ‘FAITH’. They shot and killed – in a stutter of bullets – tired train commuters, bread winners, lathi carrying policemen, ailing patients, mothers and babies, a priest and his wife, a teacher, courteous hotel staff, unarmed diners, unsuspecting tourists and peaceful beer drinkers. For three nights they threatened, murdered, maimed and held hostage. Till, at dawn, in a hail of machine gun fire, a body tumbled out of a window of the Taj and lay still on the pavement, as if announcing an end to the siege. It must have taken extraordinary ‘courage’ by these men, afterall, to look an alarmed 20-something, unarmed receptionist in the eye or an innocent commuter facing the other way, and not quail before pulling the trigger. The world, in the end was horrified and appalled by the cruelty of these men and their sponsors and equally frustrated by a government that seemed powerless to stop this from recurring. The citizens took to the street in a fury and a volley of criticism, shrill TV anchors and tear stained show hosts, left three politicians redundant.
This is the countenance of 21st century conflict, not one between states but between groups of anonymous men and states. Frequently the victims are innocent bystanders and the state itself. The causes are real, occasionally nebulous and sometimes imaginary. The disaffection over the exploitation by one group over another, the tensions over land, water, resources or jobs and sometimes simply a sense of individual isolation have all led to acts of violent expression. The permanently warring tribes of Africa, the Israel-Palestinian tensions, the killing by school children armed with anger, are cases where two sides have failed to resolve matters in a mature manner and have decided to abandon reason. The means of addressing these differences are often by recourse to attacking defenseless civilians because the proponents cannot win a conventional war or justify their cause in courts of law. There are milder forms of terrorism – the use of force by political parties to prevent ‘out-of-staters’ from applying for local jobs, by unions preventing other workers from attending work, by brute political majorities crowding out minorities, the enforcing of unlawful mileage-driven ‘bandhs’ by intimidation and destruction of and damage to property, trains and vehicles. Here too violence is a partner to this phenomenon.
The dilemma of what is the appropriate response to terrorism has been engaging most minds recently. To defend ourselves adequately, security, education and appropriate laws must take centre stage alongwith the finance portfolio. Our best politicians must be in charge, perhaps a quick change of attire need not be a qualification. A central (but not over centralised) rapid response agency to handle intelligence on terror groups and terrorist attacks, a propaganda effort, a unified agency to guard our borders and ports of entry are imperative, cutting off of sources of terrorist funding, and systems in place to ensure that there are means to keep the systems in tone. There is a role for the defence forces in this scheme too - being capable of surgical strikes in enemy territory to ferret out specific targets are an essential part of terror fighting capabilities. Without collateral damage the enemy will continue to act without fear or reprisal. As the PM said, in the thrilling monotone of a train announcer, there must be a cost to this.
The training of politicians to handle terror is necessary as otherwise, if the commanding heights of the polity are ignorant of the tactics, then the effort will come to naught. There needs to be proper instruction for negotiating, secrecy and team work so that a tipping of the nation’s hand will not occur. The inability of the Indian state to protect its citizens has been all too apparent over the past ten years, all this after being in the cross hairs of terrorist activities and losing more people to it annually than any other country, save maybe Iraq. The glum reminder is that the nation will continue to be at risk, as there is a lack of competence in the leadership. The fact that the event could not be preempted, the six hour wait for a ‘rapid action force’, the absence of a chain of command for dealing with the crisis and for enterprise was disturbing. Some lapses like basic training for the police force in target shooting were indefensible with most policemen predictably not hitting anything, for not having fired a single practice bullet in years.
Regardless of all this, even with one of the largest defence budgets in the world we will not be safe unless we are able to bring competence and conscientiousness to, and counter corruption in, our citizenry and governmental agencies. A police force preoccupied with bar girls when terrorists are loose is clearly misdirection. We all need to look at good citizenship as a responsibility. Considering that the perpetrators in the past were guided into the country sometimes by officials we must know that corruption is terrorism and must be dealt with likewise.

The Right to Children to Free and Compulsory Education Bill 2008, introduced in December 2008 is a welcome step as it seeks to do away with the practice of schools taking capitation fees before admission and subjecting the child or parents to any screening procedure. The bill proposes to make radical changes in the primary education system like not failing or expelling a student till class VIII and also seeks to ensure that no child is subjected to physical and mental harassment.
Our present education system emphasises on rote learning and does not encourage students to think creatively. This has led to increase in dropout rate among primary school students despite efforts being made to achieve 100 per cent literacy in the country. Mid-day meals alone cannot lure economically backward children to schools.
The only way to encourage students to learn is to offer them a comfortable and creative learning atmosphere in schools rather than putting them under the strain of examination. The benefits of the bill will be seen only if teachers play a more proactive role and make learning fun for students by using novel methods to teach. Therefore training teachers and orienting them to achieve the desired results is equally important. Parents too should ensure that their child goes to school.

Mrs. Sucharita R. Hegde

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