Terror
By now the media would have numbed you with their incessant reportage of the incidents of “26/11”. Much has been said and much more will be said by every one who thinks he / she has an opinion to matter. I have my opinions too, but they are not on 26/11.
Yes a bunch of motivated, misguided young men created havoc and it spurred endless chest thumping jingoism for all and sundry. We have also heard enough of the “Spirit of Mumbai” that is attributed to the ability to recover each time. Pause for a moment and look at all this with a cynical eye, I did and I think it is silly.
Firstly these men have killed around 200 and wounded double the number in the space of 4 days and they are terrorists, hordes of men killed innocents in Orissa with simpler and cruder killing devices and they are rioters or religious zealots. I ask you for the victim cowering in fear is there any degree of terror, do the flames evoke lesser fear than bullets and grenades? Just because they cannot afford to dine in swanky places and not worth media reportage are they any lesser than those who laid down their lives? Blood is after all red for one and all and there is no blue blood except in books. For many of us far removed from these spots all this is just another gory soap opera, pause and look inward: how many people are killed or maimed by bad drivers, be it a Blue line or MTC bus, a BMW, the ubiquitous Tata truck or any other vehicle every day? The weapon of death may have morphed from a sword or a Kalashnikov to a harmless looking vehicle but the end result is death plain and simple. For such angels of death the law is so lenient that it is a joke.
And coming back to the “Spirit of Mumbai”, as I commented in another blog earlier it is a fallacy and a big joke. Mumbai gets back on its feet and life goes on because people simply do not care. You loose a loved one and what do you do? Cry for a few days, feel dejected, come back to your senses, get back on your feet (in many cases), and carry on. If the deceased is an acquaintance, feel sad for a few hours or minutes then carry on. If the deceased is just a statisic…I think that this Spirit, the Spirit of “I don’t care” is universal, after all we all have our jobs to do, families to take care of, bills to be paid, a life to be lived.
If we really feel bad about it, lets stop the blame game and do something about it. Just see what the power of the people is doing in Thailand otherwise lets get back to work.
Just received by SMS:
“An Olympic shooter wins Gold (only a game) & Govt. gives him 3 Cr + awards. Another shooter dies, fighting with terrorists, (saving our country and our lives) & Govt. pays his family 5 Lakhs. Truly great India?!?
(Pls fwd to all all Indians, that it somehow reaches the President, PM, CMs, IAS & all concerned)”
- Thanks Fletcher and Nitin Naik
the SMS was powerful- a different angle of the whole thing, but like ya said, no matter how painful it feels, i guess 'the show must go on, n go it does!'
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ReplyDeletethis attitude is widespread. the other day i was in the bus and two motorcyclist collided sideways and one fell down. the other was busy picking up his bike and the rest of the two wheelers waited restlessly for the whole thing to clear up and the minute the man got up and picked his bike everybody rushed to reached their destinations!!! the pitiest thing was nobody helped the guy to get up or pick up his bike!
ReplyDeletebcoz life has to go on...come what may.
people are really waking up. many meaningful smses did the rounds...including the raj thackery ones. hope we all bring about a change successfully
ReplyDeleteTerror has become a religion on its own. People involved in these terror activities do not really belong to any caste or creed.
ReplyDeleteI strongly feel that it is high time people like you and me became more sensitive to these issues and took our stand more strongly. After all, we are the ones who can make a difference felt.
It is not just this lone incident but so many other killings and murders happening all over the country and the numerous blasts that have been rocking India for the past few months now which should have changed our outlook by now and made us start an united and strong movement to redeem ourselves.
So absolutely true. People dying in Darfur are no different from those getting run over by drunk drivers. But honestly, however much I think I cant come up with a way to combat terrorism (as a part of the mass). Let me know if you have some ideas.
ReplyDeleteI think all like minded people not just from India but from all over the world should unite together and protest against this in one voice. It could be a political movement or a social one. But the BIG question is: ARE WE ALL READY TO DO THIS? Please give your comments on this.
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