A desire to change....?

Yesterday's blasts in the heart of Delhi perhaps once again served to lull us out of what is increasingly seeming like a sense of security and complacency. Whatever may be the cause célèbre behind this and all other related incidents is perhaps beyond the point now; this isn't the act of rational people, so reason isn't exactly what we need to comprehend here.

That those who plan such dastardly acts care neither for the lives of innocents nor even for the tenets of their own faith is reflected in the fact that this incident has taken place in the middle of what is regarded as the holiest month in the entire Muslim calendar, a time for fasting, penitence and penance. Surely a true believer would not have resorted to such extreme means at a time when the Lord seeks him to be most forgiving? And perhaps this again is the wrong question addressed to the wrong people, because no person who truly believes in a Divinity could be so barbaric, so heartless.

While we heap opprobrium on the assailants, we must also realize that it is high time that we safeguard ourselves from such attacks in the future. While it is impossible to completely neutralize the threat of such incidents, it is always good to be able to and to minimize them as far as possible. Newspapers and the television media have discovered that Indian intelligence agencies had knowledge of the potential threat, and have insinuated that despite having such 'knowledge', the agencies chose to sit quietly. I wonder whether these agencies knew anything about these incidents beyond the fact that they could occur, something that even a common man could know. And this shouldn't be construed as a criticism of the agencies, because I doubt terrorist organizations publish a list of coming events for the next month for the perusal of the public.

What hampers the intelligence agencies the most in India is the lack of a pan-India policing agency or a federal law and order body. Intelligence gathering, being a preserve of defence and law and order, is a centralized activity, but acting on intelligence, when gathered, is left to different state police agencies, which do not necessarily collaborate with each other. Internal rivalries, Himalayan egos, and a tendency towards blowing one's trumpet at the cost of the greater good have time and again hampered what should have been seamless investigations. In this year alone, four different cities have been afflicted by the venom of terrorism. With one federal agency, it could have been possible to investigate all these crimes more effectively, as often where the same organization is behind such crimes, crucial evidence is left behind, something that can enable creating a chain of responsibility back to the organization itself.

Perhaps it is too much to ask of our political class to give up their regional loyalties in favour of a national spirit. Perhaps we may as well go on dying, because in the end, we are the people who create the political class who is wont to let us die and do nothing about it. And if we aren't prepared to die, perhaps next year when we have the chance, we may vote for a change. Platitudes to the dead and consoling the injured may work for a month or so, but the wounds that these incidents inflict on the soul of our society are festering, and it is the need of the hour that we, the people who ultimately matter, do something about this. It is not just our duty to our society; it is our duty to our families, to ourselves.

Double standards...

Today marks the 39th anniversary of an incident that perhaps changed the course of the Vietnam War, and firmly established the duplicity that has come to characterize the American stand toward many issues, terrorism included.

The My Lai massacre, committed on March 16, 1968 by U.S. soldiers on hundreds of unarmed Vietnamese civilians, remains to date a shameful blot on the U.S.'s claim to being a nation founded on liberty and freedom. U.S. soldiers had killed more than 300 Vietnamese, which comprised mainly of aged people, women and children, purportedly in a search operation aiming at rooting out Vietcong guerrillas and their supporters.

The search operation found no insurgents in the village. On questioning the villagers present there, the U.S. soldiers found them either pleading ignorance, or showing reluctance to provide any information, a logical stance, considering that the U.S. weren't exactly very popular at this stage in the war. Fearing, or so they claim, that these villagers were in truth Vietcong supporters, the U.S. soldiers herded them into ditches and mercilessly executed them with automatic firearms. The commanding officer, at the height of this killing frenzy, even expressed the desire to throw hand grenades into trenches harbouring villagers.

From an account gathered by the Peers Inquiry from one of the participants who described using a baby for target practice during the massacre:

He fired at it with a .45. He missed. We all laughed. He got up three or four feet closer and missed again. We laughed. Then he got up right on top and plugged him.

Convinced beyond doubt that any and all villagers of My Lai were a threat, the soldiers decimated the entire village, killing innocents in the age group of one to eight-five. If a one-year old can be a threat to the U.S., God save them!

The military then shamelessly attempted to camouflage the carnage as a military victory with the death of over 100 'enemies'. Colin Powell, former U.S. Secretary of State and then investigating officer, simply white-washed all allegations of brutality on the part of the U.S. and the South Vietnamese forces towards innocent civilians. It was only when returning soldiers echoed stories of such horror in the U.S. to the media that the incident was brought to light, and the offenders prosecuted.

The Americans did not find it a tad difficult to execute leading military personnel of Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany for having issued the orders to commit crimes against innocent people. But when it came to punishing Americans guilty of the same crimes, the U.S. showed a strange reluctance. Of the 26 men charged with the crime, only one, the commanding officer, would be convicted, and he too would serve barely 4 years in prison before being pardoned, purportedly because an officer cannot be prosecuted for following orders.

Whatever may have been the justification for the Vietnam War, the conduct of the U.S. soldiers sorely fell foul of the principles of jus in bello. The acts of war should have been directed against those who have wronged the U.S., and not towards innocents caught in situations not of their making.

That the My Lai massacre was barbaric goes without saying. Comparing this with the Holocaust would be presumptuous, and yet the sheer abandon of reason is the same, whether it was by the Nazis or by the Americans. My Lai would strengthen the anti-war movement in the United States, and eventually, after 7 years, the U.S. would withdraw, in what would be the only military defeat they had suffered till then.

The Americans choose to depict the Nazis and the Japanese as the ultimate symbols of evil. But I wish to state that for their reluctance to prosecute, for their desire to subvert justice under the garb of command responsibility, they have done the world greater wrong than the twain could ever have done. Those who claim a moral high ground are obliged to maintain those heights. Even Caesar's wife must be above suspicion, for Caesar to be venerated.

This is not the time to turn back....

Terror has no name, no face, no religion, no creed, no commune, and no emotions. Those who are wont to inspire such horror in their fellow beings have no humanity, no civility, and no sense of propriety. Their mission is disadvantaged by their affiliation. Their fellows from their communes and religions are maligned because of their cowardice. And innocent blood lies on their heads, preventing them entry into the heavens, if there be something such as so.

The blasts on the Samjhauta Express on Monday are the most dastardly and horrendous of crimes that a people can have committed on them. When, despite all odds, they have resolved to forgo their differences, and come together to forge a new future, that such cowards should so try to delay and destroy the path to a peace that this subcontinent sorely needs is nothing short of a horror.

But this is not the time to sit in grief, to just mourn the dead with tears and floral tributes. This is the time to show the terrorists that we are not on this road to move back. That this is not a journey that we have undertaken just to give up when faced with a few boulders. That we will not be defeated by their tactics of hate, that we want to live a new day, a day of peace, a day of happiness. It is a moment to show that innocence has no nationality, that grief binds us even stronger than before, and that this grief, which they have wrought upon us, will see us through this and all other assaults that they may shower upon us.

Those who have conspired to such a horrendous act do not deserve even the most basic of human prerogatives, for by this act, they have abnegated their humanity. Only by punishing the guilty with the highest penalty that the law provides for, can we hope to lay the souls of the departed truly at rest.

The law must take its own course - II

So finally the State crumbled before the demands for clemency. The edifice of justice, so often assaulted and insulted in the long decades of our independence, may never have faced such a barrage, such a mockery of its actions. The Emergency may have asked of the judiciary to bend themselves before the powers that be and ensure favourable verdicts, but now the judiciary must agree to even changing their verdicts, should they not be in conformity with what is deemed as popular opinion. And what determines popular opinion? God alone knows? I for one, was neither asked my opinion on the demand for clemency, nor am I so presumptuous to believe that my previous blog could have had any effect on the Executive. That remains the case of many in my know and surrounds.

The justification that the State provides for having even stalled the scheduled execution of Mr. Afzal is that the President is seized of the matter, and pending his decision, the matter is on pause. And yes, had the State rejected the demand outright, it could have ensured that the Vale burn for another decade. Perhaps the worthy minister who issued the statement wishes to imply that a delayed rejection would have a somewhat different result. If the State will permit the Vale to burn, the Vale will burn! Let us not pretend to innocence, for we aren't bottle-suckling babies.

But what if the State crumbles so far as to grant Mr. Afzal a reprieve on his life, what is one to say that every other criminal sent to death row would muster up a crowd, and a following, and ensure that his/her death sentence is commuted? The Supreme Court has, through its directives, ensured that the death penalty is used only in the rarest of rare cases, and surely high treason falls in that category. To grant Mr. Afzal a reprieve would be to call into question the State's decision to hang Dhananjoy Chatterjee, who even if guilty of the most gruesome of crimes, still is innocent of treachery against his people.

Mr. Afzal's being an educated soul, a devoted family man and his assumption of other such roles shouldn't be used as a pretext to grant him clemency. Many men before him have died as traitors while assuming these and many other such ideal roles. If he is all that it is claimed he is, and I don't wish to doubt that even for a moment, then perhaps he would never have done all that he did, and I would not be writing this blog. But sadly, his happiness couldn't preempt him from committing high treason, could it? So the punishment is justified.

The State may wish to be seen as merciful, but I pray, not now. Not when your honour as a nation is at stake. Forget not those who have lain their lives to ensure that the scourge of terrorism is kept at bay. You, the keepers of Power, have the onerous responsibility of doing what will make history. Pray, do this job well!

The law must take its course...

The Indian judiciary may not be the paragon of virtue that the Goddess of Justice would have been proud to acclaim as her own, and yet it is as dignified and respectable as any judiciary is in a developed country, and even better in some cases. Its decision to reject the appeal of Mr. Mohammed Afzal is one rooted in common sense; no crime can be allowed to go unpunished, no criminal may presume that his/her act against society will be pardoned with the largesse that he/she denies that very society.

Whether Mr. Afzal is guilty or not is a matter that the good judges have debated over for weeks together, and I have full confidence in their impartiality in this, as in many other matters.

But it would seem that those whom we entrust the responsibility of safeguarding these laws are themselves set to undermine their efficacy. The Chief Ministers of Jammu & Kashmir, and Tamil Nadu, in their official capacities, have entreated the President to grant Mr. Afzal clemency and commute his sentence to life imprisonment.

The CM of Jammu & Kashmir, the native state of Mr. Afzal, reckons that should the Government of India fail to accept this request, the entire state of Jammu & Kashmir would erupt into flames. While it is true that popular sentiment is on the side of Mr. Afzal in some sections of society there, surely that is no excuse to deny those deserve justice their due. And if the CM is so very sure of his inability to control any conceivable situation, let him abdicate his chair, and let a more competent individual occupy it. But at least do not make such a mockery of the State that you claim to represent, from which you derive the legitimacy of your authority. And please, don't make this into a India vs a particular state affair, or a particular religion's matter because it is ever so much the affair of every denizen of this nation, irrespective of religious and regional affiliations.

Terrorism begets terrorism, and yet, the death penalty for Mr. Afzal is perhaps the least we can do in our society to people who have plotted against their nation, against their people, for whatever their reasons may have been, no matter how benevolent their motives may have been. Mr. Afzal has committed treason, and there ought to be no pardoning such crimes, for then what remains the efficacy of the laws?

True, laws are made for men, not the other way around, and yet I appeal to the better sense of the powers that be to refuse any demands for leniency. In 1989, we released a few terrorists and unleashed terror on the Vale. In 1999, we released another terrorist, and reinvigorated the flagging struggle. Let not Mr. Afzal become another symbol for these demons, who would kill innocents for their own ends!

I presume Mr. Afzal to be guilty, and yet, if he be innocent and has been framed, then he will be served justice in a Higher court, but on earth, let the laws of men take their course.

The struggle must go on!

The brutal murder of Maniappan Raman Kutty, an employee of the Border Roads Organisation, by the Taliban in Afghanistan is yet another example of how a warped vision of the world can try to drown out the legitimate concerns for development and progress of the people. The Taliban's sole aim seems to have become the overthrow of the Hamid Karzai administration, and the reversion of the Afghan state back to the Dark Ages. In this process, if innocents die, merely because they did the unforgivable deed of assisting the current Afghan government in dispensing its duties, well that's fair, because this is war.
But, it really isn't fair. If you have an issue with Karzai, talk with him, or even declare an open war on him, and resolve the matter once and for all. Don't slowly and steadily corrode the nation for which even you profess love and affection. Don't harm those whose intentions are noble, who only desire to assist your people in their aim to progress, to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the rest of the world. They don't seek to take sides in your struggle, they don't care who rules the State, so long as they can go about their job of helping the people smoothly. These are the basic expectations from those who seek to help your people.
And, whilst I write this, I am cognizant that somewhere down there, even I am reconciled to the fact that we are speaking to a wall. That those who seek to harm, harm not because of ideological persuasions, but out of sheer animosity, a despicable desire to undo all the good that can be accrued out of development and progress. Kutty hasn't died a victim; he has died a matyr; a matyr to the cause of humanity, a hero for the oppressed people of this world, a man who despite all odds persevered to assist those who were related to him, not by blood, but the holiest of all relations, by their humanity. His death must not go in vain. His deeds must live on. The struggle must go on.