Sunday, May 23, 2004

another day ... another attack ... so what?

Another day goes by in Jammu and Kashmir, and another attack ... This time a very deadly one on a bus carrying BSF soldiers and their families. The Hizbul Mujahideen claim responsibility for it.

A new government in New Delhi has taken form, but the same story continues in J&K. Even we as a people have become so used to it, that it does not provoke as much outrage as it should. And in such a climate, "normalization" of relations with Pakistan sounds like a joke. In all this policy of encouraging peaceful relationships with Pakistan, we seem to have conveniently forgotten why we almost went to war against them in 2002 in the first place. Come to think of it, all the normalization effort seems to be from our side - while the "state supported terrorism" continues. We went to Pakistan to play cricket, got their cricket board out of bankruptcy, spurred local economies with the sellout games (thank God at least we won!!). We reopened airspace, reestablished diplomatic relations - Pakistan really gained a lot out of it - did we gain anything more tangible than brownie points on the world diplomatic scene? Do these brownie points get us anywhere?

The new PM reacted to this act saying
My heart goes out in sympathy to the members of the bereaved families. Their loss, which is shared by the entire nation, is truly irreparable
I agree - the loss is indeed irreparable, but is there something more we (as a nation) can do than merely issue a condemnation? Hopefully, those who died yesterday were worth more to us than another story in the news ...

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Aditya,
You may be interested in reading this article by B. Raman
http://us.rediff.com/news/2004/may/28raman.htm

Aditya said...

niket - thanks for the update (although, i'd rather you sign off on the comments, just so that we know who they are from!)

b.raman has hit the nail on the head ... the reluctance of successive governments to embrace and appreciate the sacrifices that continue to be made is indeed unfortunate. the IPKF story in Lanka is no different. Rediff has a good post-facto review. the new government seems to be again going the same road ... hopefully that will change.

Anonymous said...

> i'd rather you sign off on the comments
Mea culpa

> the IPKF story in Lanka is no different.
> Rediff has a good post-facto review.
Hey, thanks for the link!

Niket