India after Mumbai

A curious thing happened in Delhi on Wednesday, the day after seven bombs killed 200 Mumbaikars: the national government seemed to wake up to the fact that the country faces a security threat. What it was doing before this was encapsulated by 8212; who else 8212; the home minister, who said confidence building measures with Pakistan need not be reviewed. To begin with, the home minister had no business publicly pontificating on foreign policy. Second, he had even less business saying something definitive without understanding the full import of the Mumbai attacks. But then, Shivraj Patil was on TV saying there have been four blasts in Mumbai, when the city8217;s police commissioner had already confirmed seven explosions. Clearly, the home minister needs to do more than appear like a perfectly turned-out gentleman when faced with a national crisis.

Let us not however be unfair. A lot people in the current ruling establishment join Patil in thinking that national security is a matter of adopting the right kind of political tone. For them, India becoming a recruitment ground for terrorists 8212; as our columnist explains 8212; will remain irrelevant until a suitable way is found of politically packaging this fact. For them, the sharp deterioration in the security situation in Kashmir didn8217;t carry the obvious message. For them, the spread of a terror network in Maharashtra and in some other states wasn8217;t a reason to strategise on infiltrating outfits like SIMI.

How could it be when the current political establishment sought to make such huge capital out of abolishing POTA? That the law was prone to abuse was clear. That it was junked with so much glee, and with so little thought given to security professionals8217; concerns, presaged trouble. The trouble is that security agencies are demoralised thanks to the lack of political direction. And, please note, a country at the sharp end of global-cum-local terror doesn8217;t have a foreign minister either. If terror was communalised once by parties in power, the current fashion is communalising anti-terror policy. Just how frighteningly shortsighted this can be becomes clear when you look at the strategy of terrorists: they have started using Indians to hit India8217;s major economic/ business centres. Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai have all been hit. Surely, it is time for a rethink.