This is the first Organiser cover on terrorism. But for the threat terrorism poses to our nationhood, our idea of India, we may not have attempted this. The immediate provocation, of course, was the gory serial blasts in Mumbai.
Terrorists like publicity and every word we write about them in a way serves their purpose. For, it is through our interpretations that they speak. Otherwise, how would the world know that a particular terrorist act has a message, a mind and method behind it? Perhaps most of what we write about terrorism are fictional analysis that we attribute to the actions of a bunch of mad people. Do they have a philosophy? Do they have a religion or ideology or have a blueprint for a social order? I doubt.
But one thing is clear. They have huge resources, sophisticated weapons and they make use of the latest technological devices. The story of Hamas and Hezbollah in West Asia, Maoists in Nepal and Taliban in Afghanistan gives their actions the fa?ade of political operations embedded in power play. These are societies in transition, saddled by autocratic, surrogate rulers, who never bothered about the welfare of their people. Islamic fanatics, like Maoists, have no use for democracy or fair play.
It is odd that in countries like India, terrorists are attempting their luck. Who is their mastermind? What are their manifestations in the Indian context? We have requested social scientists, security experts and concerned political thinkers to join this debate to give us a better perspective of the situation. The general view is that terrorism in India has broadly three manifestations and all of them have foreign roots and alien inspiration. It is part of an international conspiracy to keep India bogged down in internal contradictions, a strategy to perpetually bleed India, and to stop it from achieving its world vision, the chance beckoning us to emerge the super power of the new millennium.
We have a huge potential. In the West, stories of Indian successes hit headlines. The world is looking at India with a new respect. Projections of the burgeoning Indian middle class, growing literacy and the huge techno-savvy young population make an interesting reading. The world has almost stopped discussing India in the context of Pakistan. Today, India and China are the growing economic wonders.
All through these picturesque narrations, there are sponsored studies that bracket India with Bangladesh, African and Latin American countries, accusing it of poor growth rate of literacy, high rate of AIDS, child mortality, increasing poverty and grim crime rate. A recent study even alleged that India is the 6th most unsafe place for children. That our record in safety and equality of women in national life is not on par with the world standard, they say. And that minorities are unsafe and are targeted, they allege.
This is the conspiracy. There are forces that want to keep India weak. We have a live wire democracy, free press, independent judicial system and by habit Indians are the most liberal and accommodating people. We respect others? religions. And it is our history that India was the asylum for all the tortured, tormented and persecuted in the world. It is the unique heritage of India'sHindu-centric cultural mosaic.
That is why we are appalled that at least some sections of our society have taken recourse to blood-chilling cruelty, repelling and synthetic expression of maddening violence.
It will not take them anywhere. We are a strong nation. And all Indians have an equal stake in keeping this liberal tradition live and kicking. Democracy is a great healer, greater arbiter. They resort to terror tactics in the absence of mass support for their divisive ideologies. They operate outside the civil society. Take the case of Islamic terrorists or terrorists of the north-east or Maoists. Their support base is so marginal that they operate from the darkest corners of our society. They get arms and other material backing because of the cross-border access. It is more a failure and the seeping corruption in our security system than the resourcefulness of the fugitives that they are able to carry out successful terror acts. India has survived violent peasant revolt of Andhra, Dravidian anti-Hindi agitations, regional upheavals of the north-east and terrorism in Punjab. ?India is a gone case. Punjab is a gone case. Nothing can bring Kashmir back to the mainstream.? We have often heard these words uttered around us by pundits of doom. In the first two instances, we have already proved them wrong. It is here that the much-abused resilience of India comes into play. There is something eternal and changeless about India. It is our incorrigible optimism, our abiding faith in the goodness of Man.
It is tempting to paint communities and religious denominations as the wicked prophets of terror. But we believe and our experts confirm that the treacherous traitors to our nationhood form only a miniscule portion of our population. We should not give them larger than real importance. Terrorism is a passing phase. A very trying, heart-wrenching and hugely tiring nightmare. It has reached its peak in the recent years. But it will meet its inevitable end on the soils of this sacred land. For, it is here, only here, that the faith is so divinely etched in our psyche: Goodness has to triumph because Nature has a stake in it.
