Mumbai 26/11

The Mumbai terrorist attack is something that has not only shocked the entire nation but also the entire world. I believe this attack will have a huge impact in India .I agree that it’s not possible to prevent every attack. Our intelligence system can not be blamed. If a motivated person decides that he wants to cause some damage, it’s next to impossible to predict when and where he is going to attack. The problem with this attack is that, these terrorist came in via the sea, went about shooting people and then took refuge in various places and the whole process went about for quite a while. Even if one cannot predict a terrorist attack, but if terrorist go about shooting people, we expect the authorities to be able to handle the situation much quicker. I don’t know if it’s just me but 4 or 5 top police officers getting killed is not something normal. The people who are supposed to lead the operation getting killed, all at once is something really disturbing. The whole situation exposed the unpreparedness of our police system.

I was just looking back at the entire incident. Initially I was impressed by the way the politicians handled the whole situation. The Prime Minister and the leader of opposition seemed to be united. Well, I came to such a conclusion way to early. I felt the BJP made a lot of hypocritical statements. Today, for no apparent reason we see Narainder Moodi, who starts to cry when one asks him about the godhra riots which was “handled” by him, comes to Mumbai and has a press conference at ground zero as if he was some important national leader, while the encounter was still going on. I guess he forgot the fact that he is hated in most of India. It’s quite appalling the way in which the BJP handled the entire situation. Anything that the BJP has to say on terrorism can be termed as hypocrisy. All the terrorist attacks that happen in India are in one way or the other because of the BJP. Terrorist attacks in this form started happen only after the demolition of the Babri Masjid, which was pioneered by the BJP and its affiliated sorry excuses for cultural organizations. Who can forget the way they handled the communal violence in Gujarat and the Kandhar hijacking, which happened when the BJP government was in power. They released terrorist, who are responsible for almost all the terrorist attacks that happen around the world. So the BJP has no freaking moral right to preach about terrorism. These attacks would have taken place no matter who was in power. If the BJP doesn’t watch itself and tries to take too much political mileage out of this, instead of having a hung assembly after the elections, the BJP, like last time out, because of its arrogance would find itself sitting in the left side of the house. By no means am I defending the congress. They have to admit their failure but the BJP is making sure that a lot of hatred that the peopel will have for the ruling is shifted towards them. 

I hope Raj Thakkare wont have a problem with the non Marathi NSG officers saving Marathi lives.  

The notion of having newer terror laws is purely a political propaganda. These terrorist come out to die. No law is going to deter them. What we need is a well equipped police system. People should not be allowed to run around with guns firing at people. Even though our forces are doing a very good job in handling the present situation, I feel that a lot more needs to be done. The police forces need to get more training and should be well equipped. There is no way that we can eliminate terrorism in the near future. What we can do is be prepared for such attacks, Modernization holds the key.

Our intelligence system has been getting a lot a stick. I feel people are being a bit unfair to do so. The geographical position of India is such that it’s a miracle we have had only these many terrorist attacks. We have wonderful neighbors; Pakistan, Bangladesh and China. China is not directly involved in the terrorist attacks in India but their support to Pakistan is really hurting us and I believe that is something that they want. We have a humongous cost line. To patrol the entire cost line is not an easy task.

People might wonder why India has more terrorist attacks than say USA. USA is very far from Pakistan and Bangladesh. It takes some doing to travel across the world with weapons and create havoc. It because of our relative position in the world that we are facing this many terrorist attacks.

What this attack has done is that it has shaken us very badly. The Prime ministers address to the nation was very strong. He literally said that Pakistan was involved in the attacks in one way or the other and said that there will be serious consequences. The way the PM has handled the entire situation is quite commendable. For the first time he is acting like the Prime Minister of India. The External Affairs Minister, Pranab Mukkerji, also had some strong words for Pakistan. Top officials of our forces have also blamed Pakistan. Now from what I have seen so far, there is a serious deterioration of Indo-Pak relations which in turn can lead to a war. The Pakistan officials keeping that in mind are constantly in touch with India. War at this point of time can cause India dearly (economically).Right now we are in a situation where its gonna be really hard for us to find a job, on top of that if we have a war or something similar, things wont be too good for us. I really hope that such a step is not taken. I honestly do not think that the present government in Pakistan is directly involved in terrorist activities that originate from Pakistan. Moreover a war will destabilize Pakistan more and the situation won’t be favorable for India. I hope we handle the whole issue wrt Pakistan cautiously. The way the Pakistan side is reacting shows the seriousness of the matter. You see people in the highest level giving press conferences every 30mins, and are willing to answer each and every question. They are not acting in a way heads of states are supposed to act. This shows that even they are aware of the Pak link. Sending the ISI chief to India, how often does that happen?

This attack has had a huge impact on our image. We are going through tough economic times and this attack will affect us very adversely at least in the short term. The attack depicts India to the world as an unsafe place. Our political and intelligence system have got a bashing in the international media. There has been a huge dent in our image in the international front. Above all that the attack has angered the Indian public. As a result of this attack many changes can be expected on the ground. This attack in a way has helped us see the loop holes in our system. Hopefully the sentiment won’t die off and we can get to so some solid steps.

These terrorist who looks like school kids, have managed to terrorize a nation for more than 50 hours. Two things can be inferred out of this. First, they are well trained and are damn good in what they do. Second it doesn’t give a “good impression” about out preparedness. One terrorist with no hostages holding up scores of NSG personals, I do not know what to say.

Another thing that came to my notice was the accolades that the employees of both the hotels got from the trapped tourist. They have taken customer satisfaction to an all new level. There have been reports of many hotel staff putting their life at risk to come to the aid of their guests. The tourist also had praises for our security forces. I was also pretty impressed with they way many news channels handled the whole issue.

Even before the terrorist attack it was quite obvious that if some one comes up with a gun and starts shooting anywhere in the country, the chances of the person being gunned down before causing soem damage is very low. But this incident just took it to a whole new level. I hope serious reforms are made and our forces made more equiped to handle such situations. 

Tragic the situation is, but I believe that a lot of good is going to come out of this. My heart goes out for every one who lost their lives. I was touched by the brave relatives of the people who lost loved ones. When the going gets tough the tough gets going. This incident has proved that in a crisis all humas are tough. 

Innocent until proven guilty?

Better to let 100 guilty men go free than to convict one innocent man, Innocent until proven guilty. These principles epitomize Indian democracy. The freedom that all of us enjoy, the sense of security that we feel, is because of this principle. Unfortunately today, I feel that some parts of the media have made a complete mockery of this. I do agree that all news channels to certain extend support the alleged victims to a certain extend, but certain other channels find it their duty to play the role of judiciary. I don’t watch all the news channels in India, but from the few I watch I found that, the news channel "Times Now"" is ridiculously amateur, completely unethical and out right stupid. Most of the murder cases that get covered by the media, they decided to come to a judgment just on the basis of what the alleged victim says.  

Recently a goa minister’s son was accused of committing a rape of a German minor girl. The son might very well have done it. From him looks and his fathers track record its very likely that the son was guilty. An average person on the street can come to such a conclusion and may be tell every one but news channels need to be more responsible. Media has a huge impact on the public. It shapes their views. To blindly come to a judgment is ridiculous. To move ahead without even considering the fact that the allegation could be false is utterly dumb. It could well be a political propaganda.  

I have a problem with this news channel. My parents seem to love it. They say they get politically unbiased views from this channel. They might get a politically unbiased view, but the views that they get are utterly stupid. Its one thing to have your own opinion on issues, but to spread ridiculously stupid views to the entire country and there by misleading the entire nation is unacceptable. Watching this channel made me realize what the term "evils of the media" really meant. They blow things completely out of proportion. Sensationalize things to the core. Take what people said completely out of context and put the worst possible meaning into it. There have been instances where their reports have been found to be false. They like to play with the emotions of the public.  

I do agree that we got a few good news channels here and if this channel follows the same path with its amateur reporters they would go bankrupt. I can understand spicing up the news but taking the soul out of the news, i.e. the truth, is showing disrespect to their profession. Don’t get me started with the way in which their editor talks. He takes ages to come to the point, stutters like anything and his questions are so dumb.  

Any way coming back to the topic, the role of the judiciary should be left to the judiciary. The medias role is to ensure that justice is done and not to give out judgments. They should look into the hindrances in the justice system and not play the role of a judge. They should always respect the fact that there could be a 1% chance that the accused could be innocent and keeping that in mind should refrain from defaming the person. I believe the role of the media is to report objectively. They can show passion in their reporting but should have a sense of reality with that. News channels influence a lot of people and they should always keep that in mind

Realization

The dog incident reminded me how things can change within seconds. The dog and his friend were simply walking around, playing and all of a sudden one of them gets hit by a car and is badly injured (not sure if it is dead by now or is still alive). Neither of the dogs would have ever imagined such a thing would happen. The whole incident shook me, it hit me like a bolt of lightning. The sense that I own my destiny, I am in control of my future, just got knocked out of me. It reminded me that anything can happen to any one, reminded me that life is full of uncertainties.  

My grand mother used to tell me that the reason why we have sorrows or bad situations is that god wants to test our faith. Another version is that god wants to ensure that we are reminded that he controls every thing and we give him the due respect. The question of the existence           of god is debatable and we can never have a final word in this issue. But I do believe that incidents such as the one I had happens so that we are brought back to the ground. Humans tend to have this false sense of assurance that every thing is under control. People tend to take for granted that they are going to live one second from now. People take for granted that nothing will go wrong. I believe that such incidents happen when one looses a sense of reality. To ensure that we get our feet back in the ground faith or what ever one wants to call it make sure that we get our feet back in the ground and recognize the fact that we are just insignificant mortals in the large scheme of things. 

Its not a dogs world

Our society is not very kind to our animal friends. Today as I was coming back home in my bike, a dog jumped in front of me and luckily I didn’t hit him. 2 seconds later, the dog runs across the road and gets hit by a car. I hear sounds of the dog crying, my dad who was sitting behind me was telling me, move on the dog died. Fortunately the dog didn’t die. On second look, I found that the dog was injured badly and it was bleeding. The immediate response of the people who were standing by was to drive that dog away. The dog ran away. It was in excruciating pain. The whole incident tells us two things. One that I am a faint hearted person and second, we as a society seriously should change in the way we treat our animal friends. 

 The dog got hit by a car, it was an accident. It happens very often here. But the sad part is, no one knows what to do with an injured animal. The kind of animal control that is popular here is the ones that are there to electrocute them. I do not know any place where one can contact to take care of an injured animal. Even if such a place is there it’s not popular enough. Animals unlike humans are so sweet and honest. They are pure at heart. If treatment and care is available for anti social thugs, shouldn’t these animals get some kind of help? There needs to be a place where people get paid to rehabilitate injured animals. They should have the resources to get these animals from the street and given them proper care. As the fundamentals of our economy are very strong I do not see any reason for not having such an organization or institute. To run such a place the help of both the government and individuals are necessary.

 Taking care of animals is not an easy task. For starters animals don’t pay you. Like the many charitable organizations that we have, we need one for animals too, a place where animals are taken care of instead of being electrocuted. On my part, an animal shelter goes into my "things to do before I die" list. No animal deserves to die alone in pain.