Everyone knows that India is a target of Islamic terrorism right? Listening to the news hype or the blog conversations on pro-hindu sites (that’s not an insult btw), you can’t help but feel that the Muslim extremists are taking over India and bombing innocent men, women and children all over the place every day. But there’s one teensy little problem with this scenario.
Islamic terrorism makes up less than 9% of all terror incidents in India! And almost all of it is in the Kashmir region.
Now that can’t possibly be true right? I mean what about all the terrorist blasts in 2009 in the rest of India? Except that there were none. Yup, that’s right. Not one damn terrorist attack in India in 2009 outside of Kashmir that we can attribute to Islamic fanatics.
How do I know this? While researching data for a reply to a blog comment – see, I do the research :) – I found that the US government has set up a worldwide terrorism tracking system which gives a wealth of information regarding terrorist attacks globally. It’s free, publicly accessible, and users can filter by country, date range, type of terror attacks, casualties, groups responsible, location within the country, generate heat maps, get victim data and many more options and you can mix n match to get the exact info you’re looking for.
It turns out, that the majority of terror attacks in India is carried out by the Naxals. Here is the complete map of terrorism in India in 2009. A total of 703 attacks.
When you filter by “Islamic Extremism”, the map changes to this with the number dropping to just 63. I got a bit of a shock on seeing this really.
Ouch..where are all the Islamic bombings? You know, the “terrorists” which our government is trying so hard to save us from. The terrorism which has every citizen in India in a funk afraid of their own shadow. It’s in the damn Naxal belt that’s where – go get em!
But please stop this crap about Islamic militants. Yeah, it happens now and then but hardly kills anyone. Not that we Indians particularly care about lives being lost. Otherwise we would have done something about train accidents in India which have already killed 285 people in this year alone.
Of course, this robs people of the satisfaction of blaming all violence in India on the Muslims. Hopefully at least some people will take note.
Now a more composed post. Earlier I was in a bit too much of hurry for my liking.
Firstly ignore my previous post. 26/11 was indeed mentioned in the data but in a different way (Pointer instead of circle) so I overlooked it the 1st time.
It seems you have taken some inspiration from media channels. Otherwise why would you twist the “World INCIDENT tracking system” and mention it as “World terrorism tracking system”.
You chose the year 2009. Many would know that after 26/11 shivraj patil was shown the boot under immense public pressure and Chidambaram took over. After that (thankfully) the no. of terrorist incidents have drastically come down and apart from 1-2 incident in 2009 it was largely peaceful. And even 2010 except for the recent blast at Varanasi. However what if we take the period from 2006-08?
Filters-
Country- India
Time period- 2006-08
Perpetrator- Islamic extremist
http://imgur.com/Vbqz0.jpg
16 incidents in 3 years excluding Kashmir look a bit too much to me. Dont you think so?
In reply to Sanchit Goyal
You just need to improve your search skills before your start blowing hot air. Here is the record for Mumbai
My scan indicated that the data does include most terrorist incidents incl the 2006 and 2008 Mumbai attacks. A better analysis will be a multi year search with analysis of number of people dead, wounded and taken hostage (rather than number of incidents, guess you can’t compare Mumbai 26/11 with kidnapping of one person in Bihar).
I did the a six year search from Jan 2004 to Jun 2010 (the extent to which data is available).
People affected by all terrorist incidents in Indian in the 5.5 year period:
Dead: 6565
Wounded: 13502
Hostage: 4808
Total: 24875
Here is the stat if you remove the numbers for Islamic Terrorism:
Dead: 5038
Wounded: 8576
Hostage: 4719
Total: 18333
You can take a call on the actual extent of Islamic terrorism vs the fear psychosis. One reason why Islamic terrorism prevails in people’s mind is that a lot of these incidents are large scale e.g. The two largest incidents since 2004 are 2006 Mumbai train attack (1099 people affected) and 26/11 (472 people affected) [Third largest is the Midnapore 2010 attach which impacted 348 people]
In a way this is similar to how because of few large incidents people fear air travel so much when per km wise it is in fact much more safer than road travel.
In reply to Anuj Gupta
I have improved my search skills but it seems like you should also improve your reading skills. I clearly mentioned 26/11 in my next post and also the reason why I missed it in the 1st place and why the 1st post be ignored.
If people affected by Islamic terrorism are less in numbers as compared to people affected by lets say naxal terrorism then it doesnt mean it is a lesser threat for “common” man. And btw this article doesnt even talk about “lesser” threat. It is saying that there is completely no threat from islamic terrorism!
The points mentioned by Ashish are very valid. One person in general doesnt need to worry about a naxal threat or a threat by LTTE unless he is in that affected area. So when he knows the affected area he can take precautions. But in case of Islamic terrorism every place is an affected area. They do not have any special targets. While naxals mostly attack police people for obvious regions terrorist works by bombing people to instill fear in them. The ideology target the common man unlike naxals or any other threat.
And taking just the numbers of people “affected” in the blast is ridiculous. For ex- Take the recent blast in Varanasi. One bomb exploded and then later atleast 2 were diffused. Now if they went off at the same time the no. of casualities would have been many more. So does that make the attack less severe just because the no. affected were less?
Finally Islamic terrorism is one thing but the other fact is Islamic fundamentalism creeping in the society. Examples-
1.) Hand chopped of a proffessor in Kerala because he put a question related to prophet mohammed in the paper and thus was accused of Blasphemy.
2.) Attacking a marriage party with stones because they were passing by the mosque and playing music in Davangere (Karnataka). That place was in curfew until yesterday.
3.) Many other incidents which you will find if you search on net- Miraj, Deganga, Bareilly, Ratlam etc. And these were not minor incidents but just the “national” media chose to skip them. They have been covered intensily by the local media.
In reply to Sanchit Goyal
Thanks for getting back on this Sanchit. In my opinion, there are other threats that cover all of India and still kill more people than Islamic terrorism. Like getting hit by lighting for example! It’s true. In most places, you have a greater chance of dying by a lightning hit than terrorism :D
Then bridges can collapse anywhere in the country (and they do), but you don’t spend sleepless nights thinking about them do you? In Mumbai, buildings collapse a few times each year in random places killing people, and no outcry is raised.
I’m not saying that terrorism is justified. What I’m saying is that it must get the correct amount of attention. Which is very low indeed compared to other concerns.
Incidentally, the Naxals kill many more civilians [wikipedia.com] than police officers. So you shouldn’t feel too safe. Just look at the map. More than 33% of India is Naxal affected!
Bhagwad –
I cannot agree with you. Your conclusions rely on using a single year (2009’s) data to draw conclusions on a sociological phenomenon that plays out over decades. The analogy with train accidents is even more misplaced. Terrorism/ naxalism operates not just through causing deaths, but through instilling a fear of future deaths if people carry out economic activity/ go about business as usual etc. etc. In doing so terrorism tries to subvert the way people normally live.
Train accidents are tragic, but they don’t exactly have the same subversive effect.
Even between Terrorism and Naxalism – it would be tough to draw conclusions without examining data over multiple decades.
Mrinal
In reply to Mrinal Sinha
If you step into a train, are you more afraid of a terrorist incident or that the train will have an accident? Train accidents are as random as terrorist acts.
But I agree with you that we’re more afraid. And that’s the point I’m trying to make. Being afraid of terrorists is irrational, stupid and giving the terrorists exactly what they want! Why are we so keen to oblige these murderers?
Hi Bhagwad, You have taken one year as a reference to base your conclusion in the blog. Stereotypes in general are not based on a year or couple of incidents to get embedded in a society. Have you been directly or indirectly affected by Islamic terrorism? I am born a Hindu, and whenever I visit ancient temples, right from my childhood I have seen defacement and broken structures in many of our national treasures. Whenever I used to ask my parents as to who did it, you do not have to guess the answer! So thats 1000 years or more of vilification of what I hold sacred. You may say its the past, the current generation have nothing to do with it and I agree with you, but the stereotype is in my heart and I will tell the same to my children when they ask me who destroyed the sculptures.
I have a Kashmiri Pandit association a stone’s throw away from my house in Bangalore. What are they doing down here? Why arent they in Kashmir? Dont ask me! The association plans to hold weekend schools to educate young Kashmiri Pandits of their heritage and culture. I see this building day in and day out as I drive to work. My day is spoilt most of the time as I realize why they are here.
Everyone talks with a perspective about one has experienced in life, and I have not experienced Naxal terrorism yet. I have also never been directly affected by Islamic terrorism but it has had a negative effect on me every day of my life and all people around me and as far I can see as of today its important for me that the government does what it can to prevent more such associations popping every other place, or preventing Naxal violence or more train deaths, for that matter.
In reply to Bharath
Thanks for replying Bharat. If I’m not mistaken, you haven’t directly been affected by Islamic terrorism either right? Or are you equating terrorism with past history?
Truth is, almost no one has been directly affected by terrorism. Certainly more people know others who have died in road accidents.
A lot of bad things have happened in history to every country on Earth. The Phoenicians, Sumerians, Egyptions, Aztecs etc were all great cultures at some point in time and were destroyed by outside intervention. India isn’t special. Those were the times. The world was up for grabs. Life was like that. And every culture did it. The Romans, the English, the French, the Mongols, Alexander, and of course, the Islamic guys.
There’s no point in us Indians feeling like the victims now. We have no relation to our ancestors. The only thing common is that we now live on the same land on which they lived nothing else. India as we know it geographically today wasn’t even in existence for much of history. Or it was as much in existence as Rome was at one time. And where is Rome now?
It’s time we forgot about past history. Keep it in textbooks. No Muslim invaders are going to come destroying the world any more. Just like there will be no more Mongols, colonials and Romans.
Let’s forget all that and move on!
In reply to bhagwad
Hi Bhagwad, I mentioned both historical and contemporary events. I wouldn’t consider something as terrorism only if it results in the death of people. I agree with you about history, I only mentioned because of the deep prejudice we have against Muslims almost when we are kids and taught the same. Present events do not help in removing them. But what about Kashmiri Pandits? When they were building their association near my house, the local authority filed a case against them because they were building a public place in a residential area. I remember the association members coming to our houses and begging us to let them build it here, as the land prices are exorbitant elsewhere and they had got it cheap somehow. I have not experienced homelessness for following my faith yet. But I have seen what it can do. Some of the others in other posts have mentioned various incidents which are happening almost every other month. One has correctly mentioned that most “national” news do not cover these incidents. Trust me, what I read in my local Kannada newspaper is way different from TOI, NDTV, etc.
I will mention to you another personal experience. Two years ago I went to Kasargod in Kerala, a small town in Kerala-Karnataka border on holiday with friends. This region is flush with money with remittances coming in from the Gulf, as is very apparent with the large number of jewelery stores around every other corner. A prosperous place you may think. I saw banners and hoarding all across different places demanding for Sharia. You may say its a crazy lunatic fringe group. Whatever, as far as I am concerned I was terrified. All my friends were too. I had never seen like that in my life before, only reading of persecution in other countries. And thats the point I am saying, that you cannot discount some serious social problem, just because it doesnt involve death of people. Among the other social problems we have in our country where the majority Hindu also persecutes other people (which is also a sad reality), Islamic terrorism is also real, and has to be addressed.
In reply to Bharath
I think we disagree of the definition of terrorism Bharath. I agree that there are many social problems (as you’ve pointed out. The Sharia thing can be scary). But that’s different from terrorism which we’re discussing here.
And of course prejudices exist which is why we must fight them. You’ve mentioned that you would pass on your prejudices to your children in your previous comment. But why? Wouldn’t you want the best for your children and give them a chance to have an unbiased view of things?
In reply to bhagwad
Hi Bhagwad, thanks for replying, I am surprised that you reply to everyone! I have been following your blog for a little while, ( I came across your thoughts on Sandeepweb sometime ago), and from your earlier articles, I kind of expected this response. IMHO, the English language is too complicated giving out so many words called terrorism, fundamentalism, etc etc thus making it very difficult for me to express myself better. I am sure you understood the point I was trying to make, probably some of it was irrelevant to the blog post. I wanted to bring your attention to events the common man like me see and experience, resulting in my own interpretation to this particular social problem, which you will not find in the “shock and awe” intending media, but our vernacular press do bring out these local issues. Thanks for bearing with me so far!
With regard to your question on prejudices, I am sorry, maybe my English was not up to the mark, but I meant that events in our history, which when I tell my children, will instill the same prejudices to them as they did to me (though I agree with you 100% that past is past). It would be hard not to I presume, as long as we keep seeing Islamic terrorism, or whatever in its form threatening whatever I hold dear. In as much as I will try to teach them to be fair and tolerant to all, I believe this prejudice has become too strong in our society, and if not me, they will catch it from someone else.
Thanks for replying, and I will keep visiting! :-)
In reply to Bharath
Thanks for the entertaining discussion Bharat. I appreciate your matter of fact way of discussing things without making it personal, and you have my thanks for that.
In reply to bhagwad
Apart from that, I congratulate Bharath for speaking what he truly feels and not hiding behind political correctness.
Let me start with my view that I prefer to see it as just *terrorism* without prefixes like Islamic or Maoist…. but I will use these prefixes to differentiate btwn them.
I guess this is news for many ppl here but I *have* been saying for quite a while that the most prevalent violent extremism in India for the past few yrs is LWE: Maoism or Naxalism or whatever.
There are multiple reasons IMO its not getting the focus it deserves:
– media buzz is with “Is.” terrorism primiarily because this is the one Western nations are being hit by. If maoists had brought down the WTC I’m pretty sure we’d be looking at a different buzz today.
– international networks and external sponsors. I do believe that “Is” terrorism has more networks and funding sources than LWE. This is one major difference. We can contain and possibly crush LWE even at its source. The prime sponsor for “Is.” terrorism in India is beyond our reach.
– LWE is mostly in the hinterlands and jungles and small towns in India, when they start targeting cities you will see the uptick in coverage and outrage. I feel this corner *has* already been turned after the Dantewada massacre and the train derailment in national, mainstream media. You are I presume talking abt the Hindu rightwingers :-)
– at least in some sections of our society LWE is actually justified …. my feeling, cant really substantiate it. I have a hard time believing that the cheerleaders for Arundhati R really decry the violence. I do not trust them when they say they condemn the violence (and immediately tack on a dozen conditions). I feel sections of our media too play a role here.
thx,
Jai
In reply to Jai_C
You’ve probably hit the nail on the head with the various reasons you’ve given as to why Is. terrorism gets more attention. Can’t disagree with much.
Bhagwad,
I read your post and almost all the comments:
A few points:
1. I give lot of importance to ‘intent’. I know your thoughts (which are different from mine) on this from some past comment of yours that you discount the element of intent from your analysis. I know for sure that a railway motorman does not intend the train he himself is manning to derail and kill others (and possibly, including himself). But a terrorist intends precisely that. In fact, many bombs are planted such that they would cause maximum deaths. I remember vaguely that explosives for a series of blasts that had happened on some Diwali eve in Delhi were placed close to LPG gas cylinders. So, motor- and other accidents for me do not count, when I have to ‘develop’ a particular kind of emotion towards terrorists. Thus, the anger against inadvertent acts that lead to death or something for which an inanimate object would be involved is significantly less. In fact, the entire body of criminal law is based on the premise that it is wrong to act out an intent to harm, let alone this attempt actually leading to harm. I can empathize with and might even be grateful to a surgeon who might attempts to salvage a relative of mine after having suffered from a burst appendix, and fails, but I cannot help but be filled with anger when a terrorist plants a bomb, which explodes in vicinity of some relative and the terrorist succeeds.
2. Being personally affected-angle: Again, this does not hold true for me. Take example of any life-threatening disease. How many people have personally suffered from HIV/AIDS? In fact, off hand I remember that even with a needle prick from blood contaminated with HIV, the probability of contracting AIDS is just 1%! But I do not think that doctors are paranoid when they take extra precautions in treating patients suffering from HIV/AIDS. Because what they are afraid of is consequence of acquiring HIV-infection.
3. It is true that naxalism has caused much greater damage to India than religion-inspired extremism. But as has been pointed out by others and also by Jai, the reasons it gets lesser focus are different. If as many naxalist attacks were to occur in cities where all the media houses are and make noise, I’m sure there would have also been terms like ‘naxalophobia’.
4. What is missing from your analysis, and which misses from many people’s analyses who attempt to show Islamic terrorism as more benign than it is thought to be is the efforts and provisions that are already underway to prevent more terrorist attacks. Just like in case of HIV/AIDS, its incidence and prevalence though alarming are still statistically insignificant (say, that compared to the ones caused by obesity, infectious disease), simply because of the awareness of its harms and the active interventions in place. However, the amount of money and manpower on any other human-caused death cannot be compared [I hope, I don’t have to take back my words on this! :D ]. At many places, I found you make a mention of road accidents. I again need to point out that it is not a case that road accidents are considered alright. In fact, many innovations like air-bags, seat belts, bumpers, collapsible frames for vehicles, speed breakers, speed limits exist simply because road accidents were and are seen as threats and their occurrence is seen as undesirable.
5. Is Islam-inspired violence simply restricted to sneaky bomb blasts? Again, I don’t think so. You have tried to disregard the amount of influence an ideology can have on collective as well as individual psyche. True, there can be other factors like economics that predispose one to turn violent, but even that is not always true. I have told you this before and point it out yet again: the amount of courage that one needs to muster to devote the fruitful years ones life to weapons training, living an austere life, being under constant risk of apprehended and killed, not having a life-partner or a family and ultimately, in some cases, blowing up oneself to pieces, is extraordinary. All these things are insane, and to fuel them needs equally insane ideas, which are ably provided for by religious ideas that form the core of Islam. I consider Pakistan army’s transgressions against India to be guided by the same ideology and psychology that fuel organizations like LeT. In fact, it is sufficient to see Pakistan army’s motto in this regard: Iman, Taqwa, Jihad fi Sabilillah. Translated into English, it means “Faith, Piety and Fight in the path of God” (click). Now just because what Pakistan army does to India is not as sneaky as what LeT does, shall we stop being paranoid of Pakistani establishments intent to cause harm.
6. You compared Christianity and Islam. Another analogy. Small pox and poliomyelitis. Small pox was also a disease, in fact, much more lethal than and damaging than poliomyelitis is and there routes of transmission are also similar. But fprmer did not vanish just like that. Many efforts had to be put in to eradicate it. And till the point it was eradicated, it extracted a heavy toll on humanity. The incidence of poliomyelitis in the World is much, much less than that of people dying every year in terrorist attacks. Also, not all of these people actually die; some ‘just’ get crippled. But I do not think that we must stop trying to prevent occurrence of poliomyelitis. Or that we must stop awareness campaigns against poliomyelitis. Yes, the hold of the Church and clergy has loosened greatly, but what was the human cost involved to come out of that? Is it ‘good’ that so many people had to die for some patently insane ideas to be defeated? You harbor the optimism that just like Christianity, even Islam would take up a benign form. And that Islam should be given a ‘chance’. [I’m not being sarcastic here]. But I do not understand what it means to give a chance. Why give chance to insane ideas?
But, I think the reason you took the effort to write this post is not because you feel that some form of terrorism needs less attention because some other causes of greater number of deaths are getting less attention, but it is because owing to this attention, Muslims are get unfairly discriminated against. Am I right?
Is it truly possible to hate a virulent ideology and not those who actually swear by it?
No as well as yes. Yes, if I take a very detached view of humanity. An extreme form of this detachment is to be able to forgive even someone who tries to kill me, because I can understand there might be no free will. But otherwise it is not possible to hate an ideology and not the ones propagating it and harboring it. Islam is not merely theology and mythology. The problem with it is that it permeates in every walk of human affairs – how to govern, what is crime, how to punish those crimes, who one can marry, whether one can charge interest on a loan and the list is endless.
It is not possible for to not have a somewhat negative view of someone who views with great respect a body of instructions, some of which are about killing infidels like me. If you point out to me, that not everyone ‘follows’ such instructions, so I must not fear. But there are problems – how do I know, which ones are exactly the ones who might follow? And of course, I need not even be overtly afraid for some subconscious negative discrimination to creep in such matters. In fact, I have openly stated that I would like my life partner to be atheist/skeptic of religion. If I am to take a job-interview and if I find two candidates exactly equally capable, I know for a fact that I would be biased towards a religious skeptic.
Discrimination against Muslims who harbor no intent to harm other innocent people owing to their differing religions truly is a serious problem and quite prevalent. I do not know how to counter it. I would not accuse Muslims living outside of Gujarat, who might harbor hatred for Gujaratis of harboring insane paranoia. Perhaps, their misgivings help them make important decisions in life. And lastly, it needs to be added that though highly desirable, not all emotions emanate from ‘logic’. :)
In reply to Ketan
Thanks for the analysis Ketan. Lots of points to cover. Let’s go one by one:
1. I agree with your first para. But it deals with why you would feel anger, and not fear. Fear is caused by the perception of an immediate threat. In the case of Is. terrorism, the threat is very low and therefore the morbid fear is irrational though the anger may not be. Do you agree with this?
2. Yes, we must take reasonable precautions against it. Reasonable in keeping with the threat. I wouldn’t want the govt. to take away the civil liberties and privacy of 1.2 billion people just to save a mere handful of lives. Changing syringes for AIDS doesn’t harm anyone.
3. Jai is perfectly right.
4. I find this point interesting, because if you read most discussion/comments on the net, people complain that the government is not doing enough, as Ashish’s post shows. Given the stats I think the govt. is doing more than good wrt Is. terrorism.
And here is the real reason I wrote this post. Not just because of discrimination against Muslims. The main reason is that our government is using the excuse of Is. terrorists to scare the population into accepting every damn violation of their liberties. The RIM incident where the government wanted to listen in on people’s private conversations without a court order is a classic example. The UID has also been used to say it’ll make us more secure. Free speech is censored because it can aggravate the “terrorists.”
I’m pissed because we’re trying to use a sledgehammer to crush a peanut.
As for hating the ideology and the person…many reading my posts might think I support Islam. Truth is, I despise all religions. Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, everything. But I love a lot of people who follow these faiths – my uncle, his daughters, my friends etc. If I wasn’t able to maintain that dichotomy, I would hate most of the world!
In reply to bhagwad
Bhagwad,
1. Yes, some fears are irrational. But, I think at certain level, fear and hatred are quite interrelated. Fear, for sure, leads to hatred. I don’t know if it’s also true the other way round. But there is some possibility, if one thinks of the ego defense mechanism commonly employed – projection. :)
2. Oh yes, I forgot the civil liberties point. My bad! Yes, I agree that if civil liberties have to be compromised upon, there need be real good reasons for that. But again, an ethical question arises. Would I be alright with losing some part of my civil liberty if even one life could be saved with such compromise? I would tend to reply in affirmative. And see for instance, the Radia tape leaks, it was not Islamic terrorism that was used as justification to breach privacy. :)
4. I do not agree with Ashish’ views. First, the Prime Minister does not have much control over governance. I mean it both ways – generically (what can a PM do to prevent terrorists in a far off place from Delhi? Moreover, it should first be the responsibility of the state government) as well as specifically (our PM has little control over actual governance, unless one agrees that the treachery in nuclear liability bill was his doing). It’s difficult to curb violence in a country as densely populated as India. To be honest, I feel the Indian services are doing a very good job despite such immense material as well as human resource crunch and the kind of sectarian divides India is faced with.
I think if I would have to modify your analogy, the government is indeed using a right-sized hammer, perhaps, they are faced with too many peanuts. :) And once in a while some peanuts explode.
The “hatred” part I mentioned was not for those who merely harboring it, but also trying to propagate it. With regard to those merely harboring, I think I pointed out that the prejudice would be subtle. Though, I have to admit that the factors enlisted by Bharath in his comments of childhood conditioning are real and they have a strong role to play. And of course, I also commend Bharath for his forthrightness.
Thanks for responding! :)
On 1. I have to agree with Ketan who has done a fine job of demolishing the motor accident analogy. While I found it a little silly I couldnt articulate this so clearly as he has done.
On 2. I am very conflicted. It looks like conspiracy theory time yet again, this time by Bhagwad* :-) that part of “….now that the govt knows how profitable terrorism is, there’s going to be no end to it…” (am I getting this right Bhagwad? from memory) was way wacky to me and straight out of Arundhati R’s playbook (or so it seemed to me anyhow).
At least in matters of clear and present danger I think I am pretty okay with govt authorities tapping lines in advance of a court order. The order would be a must and would have to be justified. There shd be safeguards to prevent any misuse of confidential info that leaks out from such taps.
I dont have much else to add to the rest of the disc other than to note that I do *not* share Ketan’s fixation on a particular religious ideology being dangerous etc. I’ve seen significant nuttiness among all shades.
thanks,
Jai
*Side note: Hmm…. Ketan has his thing abt NG family tossing bundles of gold at the media, you seem to have this one. Somebody else here had “media doing subliminal messages going to help Hindutva/ BJP”… another blog I read cautions its readers not to forget even for a minute that “we” (its target audience) walk thru minefields every day…..
Time I found one for myself too. Any suggestions :-)
In reply to Jai_C
If I had to choose, I would attribute the government’s moves to incompetence rather than conspiracy. IMHO, the government is forced to take excessive measures because the people are stupid and they want to feel “safe.” Also, I trust the courts to keep a check on the government…but like I said, the govt. is asking for phone records without a court order. The govt. must have power to do its job. But I want checks to be there to make sure it doesn’t misuse that power. The fact that all govts misuse power is pretty common knowledge in my opinion.
Thanks for your comments. I like the way you moderate between Ketan and myself :D
In reply to bhagwad
Bhagwad,
I have somehow never been able to get this. I can attribute acts of omission to incompetence, but not acts of commission. How can only a subset of leaks coming to the media in batches be attributed to incompetence?
Yes, I agree that statist governments do tend to misuse power a lot.
And I don’t think mature individuals like you [I’m confident you are! :P ] don’t need moderation. I don’t think Jai was trying to moderate. Perhaps, he is even more wary of conspiracy theories than you are. :)
In reply to Jai_C
Jai,
Thanks!
1. I think I had expressed my displeasure long back when Baby Vaijayanthi and Puppy Manohar had used a word as strong as “demolish”, though I don’t remember the word. In any other argument I would have felt flattered to see “demolish”, but here I find it unnerving.
2. Actually, I too believe in conspiracy theory that is very well laid out by Atanu Dey here – The US funds Global Islamic Terrorism (click). It posits the existence of an entity called Military Industrial Complex (MIC) and makes much sense to me. I had come across this idea in Robert Ludlum’s The Sigma Protocol and since then have always found the explanation quite appealing.
Hahaha, Jai, I’m afraid you’ve not gone through my blog posts or comments where I point out flaws of other religions, including that of ‘Hinduism’. Just like Bhagwad, I also find the very idea of ‘following’ a set of rules/hypotheses simply because somehow or the other they succeeded in propagating themselves by claiming a divine sanction a very repugnant one. In that, I dislike all religious dogma. But I feel, Islamic ideology is most threatening of all such dogma – in terms of its scale as well as its intensity. As I pointed out above, it does not restrict itself to just some mumbo-jumbo about the purported creator of the Universe, it does much more, and more worrying, successfully so.
Likewise, I (at least feel), my take on the NG family is much more nuanced than the manner in which you put it. :) I feel not just the NG family, but many other entities, including BJP, perhaps even Narendra Modi, industrialists, sportspersons and actors try to influence the media by various means. It’s just that the NG family is most influential of all the political entities. It has access to the entire funds of the Congress Party as well as vast legacy. Whereas, leaders of other parties might have access to huge funds, but at least they fight amongst each other and thus do not have access to the entire party fund. So, this makes NG family the big alligator among the fishes. If say, Narendra Modi would be in power for 2 successive terms and if his son (which he incidentally does not have) ‘automatically’ becomes the party secretary, I would start harboring similar skepticism towards him also.
So yes, not just NG family tosses bundles of gold at the media, even others do, but just that former’s bundles are much heavier! :D
It would be a disgraceful to *actually* advise you. I can only make a small mention of my philosophy. In whatever area of human endeavor where stakes are very high, my skepticism (which I have come equate with cynicism with passage of years) of people’s motives automatically gets heightened.
Take care.
Jai and Bhagwad,
Sorry for pimping Atanu’s blog, but I thought even this blog post had something to do with what we were discussing: http://www.deeshaa.org/2010/12/19/the-war-you-dont-see/
In reply to Ketan
A good read Ketan. But when talking about “desert religions,” I wish people would at least acknowledge the country with the largest Muslim population in the world – Indonesia – which also happens to be the third largest democracy.
Now I know what you’ve replied to above, but in theory at least, democracy is the very opposite of tyranny and authoritarianism. That can’t possibly be a bad thing!
In reply to bhagwad
1. A quick note on my comments: I use terms like demolish and wacky but not very seriously and definitely not in an insulting manner. It is fairly clear Bhagwad applied a lot of thinking to get to his analogies and he searches and researches for his posts. I’ve tossed back and forth btwn the 2 of you depending on the quality of specific argument as it came across to *me* and there is bound to be subjectivity involved.
and re. conspiracy theories, I thought it was clear enough from my tone that I was just joshing :-)
2. re M majority countries there is also Turkey and I think Malaysia is pretty moderate as well.
thx,
Jai
In reply to Jai_C
Jai,
1. It would be inappropriate to comment any further on the words you use, especially when I am such a huge fan of Atanu Dey, largely because he is NOT politically correct. :) I just wanted to express my discomfiture. Thanks for clarifying! :)
2. You don’t believe in any conspiracy theories? I’m curious, especially because I’ve interacted with you quite a lot (by internet’s standards). It would be interesting to read your take on conspiracy theories. :)
2. Yes, you’re right Turkey and Malaysia are also moderate. Perhaps, Turkey is quite progressive otherwise also. I do not know for sure, but I was told that was made possible only because the administrators over there had to try very hard to keep Islamic fundamentalism from rising over there, perhaps, even using the army. But I will speak more on that when I am better informed. Don’t know much about Malaysia. I just came to know pretty recently (in last 4 to 5 years) that even countries like Indonesia and Malaysia were Islamic. I think one can take both an optimistic as well pessimistic view of this phenomenon.
Optimistic- that the followers of any religious Book can escape out of the insanity if they so will. Pessimistic, because I think if one studies the trends in Indonesia at least, it seems they are gradually inching closer to theocracy (of course are quite from being actually there) rather than coming out of the grips of religion.
In reply to bhagwad
Bhagwad,
Because I didn’t write the blog post, perhaps, it’s best to ask Atanu for clarifications if you’d like.
But I don’t mind the usage and find it apt for two reasons:
1. ‘Desert religion’ is based on the origin of Islam, just like how not all Roman Catholics actually live in Rome. Perhaps, he also wished to express his contempt and disappointment that a dangerous ideology that should have at best restricted itself to the deserts of Middle East could spread so much to this degree. But again, that’s just my guess.
2. The reason Saudi Arabia gets so much focus is simply because in more ways than one it is the ‘headquarters’ of Islam. Islamic influence has largely been one way. We hear of demands for implementation of Sharia law almost everywhere (which originated in the ‘deserts’) where Islam is followed (and at some places such laws meet with success, e.g., Indonesia), but I don’t think there are popular demands in the ‘deserts’ that IPC be replicated there or even Indonesia’s democracy. In fact, I haven’t had opportunities to survey or have this verified in any way, but the more violent shade of Islam – Wahabbi Islam is also being accepted elsewhere (which had also maybe originated in S. Arabia).
In reply to bhagwad
Hi Bhagwad,
“…It’s in the damn Naxal belt that’s where – go get em! ….”
Maybe I misread you from your “freedom to offend” post or read into it things you did not intend: this above is admirable resolve, that I endorse. But it is simplistic. I dont think the problems go away if we just “got them”. Even the righty-righty blogs I read talk abt a governance deficit, present in some degree all over India but most strongly felt in the maoist areas.
We do need to fix some of those issues. At least mitigate them to whatever extent possible.
thx,
Jai
In reply to Jai_C
There may well be development problems in the naxal belt. But the “go get em” still stands nonetheless! Violence is unacceptable. Given the naxals funds, and determination, had they put 1/2 the effort into resolving their problems via political and democratic means things would have been much better.
I have zero sympathy for an organization whose stated goal is to overthrow the government using the force of arms.
This is true that Naxalism is a bigger issue for us right now.
But calling Islamic Terrorism a myth is not correct.
Yes in 2009 there were very few attacks related to Islamic terrorism but its just a single year.
Since 9\11 theres not a single successful attack on US but still its the biggest threat there.
In reply to Abhishek
The US govt. has also blow up the threat. How can it be the biggest threat when nothing happens?
This just complete ramification of truth, in this case two terms Islamic Terrorism and Islamic Extremism comes under different lens but in general both are used synonymously, this is the best example of manipulating statistics(BTW this statistics shows just 10% of the real picture), Terrorism and Extremism exist every where in the World in the form of termination of Innocent humans by a particular RACE who thinks there believe in GOD is the only truth. Coming to the Statistics part every now and then in every part of India without any provocation some violence happens which Media will not publish (eg:- Riots in Hyderabad Mar-April 2010, Deganga Riots 2010, Kerala the list is very big) as it will show the Extremist people’s real picture who are used as a Trump card by the ruling party since Independence, this all happens because the CORE of extremism as this does not happen just in India it happens every where in the World where So called followers of Religion of Peace lives (eg:- France Communal Violence 2006, Germany, Spain, UK……). The world should have listened to Jinnah 65 years ago the very words (its very true) that caused Partition of India when he said “Islam Cannot Co-Exist, it does not have the concept of co-existence”, so it will be best for the human race that extremist should be confined to there territories but they will not they want hatred to spread on the name of Religion of Peace. If you think I am wrong then just think once again how much different and peaceful this world would have been had the Religion of Peace did not exist, there would have been no such word as Terrorism………..