India is going through a very crucial phase economically. The Inflation rate is just getting back to normalcy,although at the cost of the GDP growth rate. The global financial crisis has impacted the financial situation of the country and the RBI is trying its best to restore credit stability into the system. But, Terrorism worsening the efforts is the last thing that India would ever want.
Several attacks spread across the length and breadth of the country and a major terrorist operation that lasted as long as 60 hrs, does raise a question against the lackadaisical attitude of the policy and decision makers. Most of us would agree that in order to get these things into control we need a government that can create a system which should be assertive in suppressing terrorism. That said and understood, there are a few key aspects beyond the democratic setup that have fallen apart which need to be focused before drawing action plans for the future. They are:
1. The weakness of the relations we have with the Pakistani Government - The root of a lot of problems pertaining to peace and religion faced today have their roots in Pakistan. The terrorists have been proved to have Pakistani Origin. The Pakistani Government's non co-operative acts like sending an ISI Director and not wanting to send the Chief add to the misery of the relation. The mud slinging by politicians in Pakistan on their Indian counterparts by claiming that similar attacks have been planned against Pakistan as well ,worsens the little respect we have for each other. All we can infer from this political drama is that peaceful co-operation amidst the neighbours on issues like terrorism is impossible.
2. The negligence of the Indian Intelligence System - With all due respect to the CBI, an attack of this size and duration cannot come as a surprise package to the Indian Intelligence and it in fact did not. If the media is to be trusted as a source it claims that the CBI had information that the Taj would be attacked. But, the seriousness associated with the information died with time. As the attention faded the terrorists had actually utilized this time to such an extent that they had a dry run before the execution.
3. The vulnerability of the Sea Shore - The terrorists apparently hijacked a vessel in the Indian waters, killed everybody on board and used it to enter the city. A lot of these terrorists have fake fishermen licenses which help them enter the city through the harbours. Issues like this expose the vulnerability at the sea ports of the country and more because its a peninsular region with a vast sea border.
4. Business relations - Targeting foreigners is not something new but targeting people who stay in these hotels implies that the intent was to shake well established business relations and damage the country's reputation in the world of business. Trade relations of a few major Indian companies with Israel(majorly Jewish nation) seem to be another interesting reason sited for the attacks. Isn't the India - Pak - Iran Gas pipeline a much bigger proposition than these deals? Why is that being pushed into oblivion?
5. The extremely weak security system - The security guards outside the Taj were armed with service revolvers and were facing an attack without protection ,let alone bullet proof jackets. This makes the attack simpler once the border is breached.
As pointed out at the begin of the blog, the phase that India currently exists shall be etched in the pages of history as a lot of momentum is being gathered to bring the country from the shadows to the forefront. All these weaknesses need to be done away with ASAP. For as long as all these issues aren't addressed properly the dream of attaining superpower status by 2050 will stay a dream.
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PS : The blog would be meaningless without paying tribute to all those people that have lost their lives safeguarding us, so we can brood over these things and fight for a better country. "May all their souls rest in peace. Amen !"
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Wednesday, November 26, 2008
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