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New
Delhi, 05 June 2002
In
this scathing piece Mohan Guruswamy laments the lack of clear
vision,
decisive
leadership and absence of ‘will to win’, among our past and
present leaders.
The
Pandit Slumbers and Sardar Dithers!
By
Mohan
Guruswamy
Even
escape to the cool heights of Himachal did not seem to spare Pandit
Vajpayee from the ill effects of the summer furies. He lamented in
Manali that he passed up a chance to strike at Pakistan immediately
after December 13. Vajpayee has been Prime Minister for a third of
the period since Pakistan began its latest Kashmir war in 1991. He
could have struck at them so many times, if the provocation was
“cross-border terrorism”. Even when Pakistan breached the LOC
and occupied the Kargil Heights in 1999, our armed forces were
expressly ordered not to cross that line. It did not matter to him
then that because of that many more soldiers had to die? That line
is held so sacred that when an IAF aircraft piloted by the AOC-in-C
of the Western Air Command strayed for a few minutes, that officer
was relegated to a non-descript little job at Air Headquarters. The
Pakistanis never considered that line sacred and have been violating
it with impunity since the days of Narasimha Rao. Was the attack on
Kaluchak the first time that women and children have been killed?
His term as Prime Minister has been the bloodiest in terms of
innocents killed. So all this bombastic talk is just talk meant for
God alone knows whom and why?
In
any case, given his recent history of retrograde amnesia, he will
soon retract what he said. Already his Foreign Minister, that master
of waffle, has said that the translation from Hindi has given an
extra but unintended edge to what his Prime Minister said. It’s
just like what happened in Goa. Like what happened in Ahmedabad. In
1998 he called for a debate on conversions and after the Staines
family was burnt alive in Orissa, he began extolling the innate
secularism of Hindu. This is not something new either to be passed
away as due to age related plaque formation. In 1942 he told the
police who came for him that it was another Vajpayee who took part
in the Quit India agitation in Gwalior and fingered him in the
process. During the Emergency he wrote to Ms. Indira Gandhi that he
wanted out, as he was no longer the same Vajpayee who had hurled
fire and brimstone at her. Now that he is Prime Minister due to
Sardar Advani’s poor judgment and good grace this problem is now
the nations’ cross to bear. He calls back every officer and jawan
from leave and puts them on battle stations and retreats to the
hills for a vacation. We never know which Vajpayee is speaking and
what to make out of him?
Vajpayee
has also known since 1998 at-least that what has been waged upon us
was an extension of the Jihad espoused by the internationalised
Islamic fundamentalists, who though originally fostered by Pakistan
are also increasingly beyond its control. Just as Vajpayee has been
unable to rein in the BJP’s lunatic fringe in Gujarat and
elsewhere, consecutive governments in Pakistan have lost the once
absolute control of the terror they spawned. Now consider the
BJP’s situation in Gujarat. If it were to act decisively against
all those known to be responsible for the post-Godhra terror, then
it will have to act against the core constituency and the irrational
impulses that have propelled its drive to power.
This
is the sentiment that believes that the Muslims in India are but an
extension of Pakistan and the exhibition of animosity towards them
is an expression of patriotism. So Vajpayee dare not say anything
that even remotely resembles and condemnation of what his party men
have wreaked on helpless people in Gujarat. That would mean
denouncing this core Hindutva constituency that wants the
establishment of a Hindu Pakistan. But if you want a Hindu Pakistan
than you cannot force an unwilling Muslim Kashmir to be in it. In
that case they would rather be in a Muslim Pakistan.
To
win in Kashmir the Vajpayee regime has to first to establish its
“secular” credentials. To do so it must act in Gujarat where it
is now very clearly evidenced that the Chief Minister actively
orchestrated the bloody attacks on Muslim localities. The NHRC
report very clearly indicts the Gujarat government’s for its
implicit connivance. No civilized nation can afford to have a
provincial government with such obviously bloodstained hands remain
in office however big its mandate and long the leftover tenure of
its term in office. Popular mandate present and even future just
cannot legitimize such people. Proof of Hinduism’s innate
secularism lies in the prosecution and punishment of those who
organized the pogrom. Are Pandit Vajpayee and Sardar Advani ready to
do this?
On
the other side the Punjabi Muslim elite in Pakistan has internalized
its inability to seize Jammu and Kashmir from India as Islam’s
defeat after an unbroken run of battlefield and political victories
over the Hindus spanning several centuries. So the defeat of India,
not just militarily but also the ideal of a modernizing, secular,
multi-national, multi-ethnic and multi-denominational nation,
becomes central to their being and for the rotten system they have
imposed upon their country to perpetuate their control. The Mohajir,
Parvez Musharaff, dare not turn his back on this. No Pakistani
ruler, civil or military, elected or imposed has dared to rethink
this self-serving obsession with India. You can only defeat this
mindset by showing them time and again, that we are a better and
superior nation. We can only make them desist by showing them each
time that we will never put up with the kind of things they have
gotten used to getting away with.
This
is as good a time as any for some introspection. We must wonder what
sort of a nation we have become? That terrorists freely find
sanctuary and are able to strike is testimony to the ineffectiveness
of our administrative apparatus. Our police is now largely
criminalized. Not just the rank and file but all the way to the top.
Our border patrolling is as ineffective as internal crime control.
There is an air of lawlessness that allows for events like what
happened in Gujarat quite routine. This Home Minister, this newly
minted re-issue of Sardar Patel, was expected to set things right.
Instead he has proved to be one of the most useless Home Ministers
India has had the misfortune to have. Things have come to such a
sorry pass that less than eight percent of murderers are caught and
convicted. The system he presides over has become so brazen that
even the most high profile murders in the nations capital remain
unpunished. Much was expected from Advani; instead the gap between
his ill-considered rhetoric and administrative inability has kept
widening each passing day. Just being a good man when you are good
for nothing is not good enough!
The
battle against terrorism and militancy can only be won by superior
organization and professional commitment. Why did it take a Kaluchak
to bring all para-military forces in Jammu and Kashmir under the
Indian Army’s command? From the day he took over as Home Minister,
Sardar Advani was told about the bureaucratic turf war between the
Army and the para-military that made them collectively ineffective.
He knew from day one that the J&K government was ineffective and
corrupt. The head of government and his top bureaucrat spent more
time gallivanting and whooping it up in the capitals watering holes,
than in providing that state with a semblance of good and effective
government. Because of this thousands of crores have flowed into the
hands of politicians, bureaucrats and their henchmen instead of
improving conditions in a war torn state. Since Advani cannot claim
ignorance it is only logical to infer that he is ineffective.
If
it were that the only reason for the problems in J&K was the
proxy war, nothing stopped us from taking the war to where it was
being waged –– into Pakistan occupied Kashmir. To PV Narasimha
Rao inaction in the face of the most brazen provocation was an act
of policy. The singular devotion to the preservation ones perch on
top of the brahminical order kept the Hindu social hierarchy intact
even after the country was first ravaged and then colonized by
foreigners for a thousand years since the Arab Mohammed bin Kasim
conquered Sind. Against this policy of sitting still the BJP
promised that it would be pro-active. How pro-active it has been is
there for all to see?
With
its intellectual and moral bankruptcy fully exposed, this government
has resorted to this elaborate charade of staging a mobilization
only to legitimize the West’s role in imposing a solution. Soon
after he arrived in Almaty, Kazakhstan for the 16 nation Asia
Pacific region security conference, Vajpayee welcomed and asked for
foreign intervention to force Pakistan to stop exporting terrorism
to India. Does he think they will impose our desire on Pakistan,
without a reciprocal imposition on India? We will no doubt hear a
renewed clamor to respect the “aspirations” of the Kashmiri
people. To do so will be to open the door to similar demands of all
the peoples who together make up the modern Indian nation.
That
the situation was allowed to degenerate into what it is today, a
ten-year irregular war by Pakistan on us is direct result of poor
leadership. VP Singh began it all by meekly handing over criminals
in exchange for his Home Ministers daughter. Narasimha Rao just sat
through his term stoically doing nothing. Vajpayee is only more of
Narasimha Rao but with some theatrical flourish thrown in. Would
Mrs. Indira Gandhi have allowed Pakistan to get away with such
brazen aggression? Would Rajiv Gandhi have allowed it? Would Chandra
Shekhar and even Deve Gowda have allowed it if they had longer
tenures? Even a professional appeaser and a political lightweight
like IK Gujral was capable of showing a stick every now and then.
Above all none of these would have given Washington the right to
meddle in our affairs as our sleepwalking Prime Minister and hand
wringing Home Minister have done. That then is our real
tragedy.
The
Pandit slumbers and the Sardar dithers!
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