Kebabs and Kargil

The mood, at the end, was exactly that when trendy crowds leave PVR or anyother multiplex at the end of a movie anywhere in India. This, despite therather heart-wrenching end, with the anchor reading out the names and ranksof the Kargil martyrs while they stand silhouetted against moonlight atop aplaster of paris Tiger Hill, Tololing, Points 5140, 4700 and so on, namesthat filled our headlines just six months ago.

A nation, and a society, particularly a democracy, must have the right toreduce its military history into soul-stirring entertainment. After all, theWest, particularly America, has done just that. From Patton to Platoon, fromThe Lo-ngest Day to Saving Private Ryan, cinema has been used as a medium topackage the bloodiest chapters of this century’s military history into masspatriotic entertainment.

In the US, as a matter of fact, this mushy militaristic romanticism hasre-ached such absurd limits that, at the Special Forces training centre atFayetteville, North Carolina, they have installed a st-atue of John Wayne,the quintessential commando, as if he won the real McCoy, while the soldierswho actually fought and died were a mere supporting cast. Each one of thesefilms, each one of the hundreds of war novels, packaged pretty much the samenational pride and patriotism that Aamir Raza Husain sells in his Fifty DayWar. So what are we quibbling over?

The problem is not with the play, but with the audiences’ (read Indian uppermiddle classes) simplistic belief that Kargil was the final war overKashmir. The even more dangerous corollary is, now that it has been won asdecisively as Husain demonstrates to you, there is nothing to worry aboutalong the Northern Himalayas. So we can sit back and relax, pr-ay that God’swrath may fall upon Pervez Musharraf, and carry on making more money on theSensex or Mindex or Brandex, if you have been fortunate enough to have asmart broker. Or that wars are fought by invincible Indian soldiers who calltheir girlfriends from a payphone and spout such lines like “Of course Ilove you, but I love my India ev-en more” before setting out on a World WarOne style assault. Or that the enemy they face, the Pakistani army, consistsof chicken-hearted soldiers and impertinent young officers, who question themotives of their generals who are silly, bloodthirsty thugs anyway with IQsvery much within two digits.

The reality is very different. Also ve-ry troublesome. First of all, Kargilas the final war over Kashmir is a very dangerously complacent notion. Thehistory of th-is country is full of such instances, where one gloriousbattle was confused with a victory forever, wi-th disastrous consequences.Second, this kind of perpetuation of the BJP’s election-time Kargil rhetoricobliterates the truth that Kargil may ha-ve been won and secured but thatthe threat in Kashmir is not just alive, it is greater than before.

While we continue to celebrate the victory in Kargil, while our elites jeer,ho-ot and clap as Husain presents a ludicr-ous sequence, supposedly fromPakistan’s embassy at Washington, where its ambassador is cursing his verywesternised female press officer for letting India run away with thepropaganda victory, the war in Kashmir is still going on. If anything, it ismore intense, more difficult and more evenly poised than befo-re. Each daybrings back the coffins of three to five Indian soldiers. Many more sufferincredible hardship guarding the ridgelines and peaks of Kargil territorythey always vacated during past winters. And we think that we won some sortof a world cup of mountain warfare at Kargil.

Romanticisation of war is one thing. But its trivialisation is quite anotherand it is not something you can blame Husain for. It is our entire urbanupper middle class mindset. Kargil toys, rifles with Kargil motifs likeAK-47s, Kargil cakes and Durga Puja tableaux with `Kargil Ganeshas’ in olivegreen bandannas and fatigues, all underline this same state of mind acrossthe country. In Mumbai’s Lower Parel, a hosiery shop has had a `Kargil sale’going for nearly six months. You ask the shop owner what it means and hewill tell you it means he doesn’t care what happens to himself or hisfamily, he has to sell at any price. As mindless as, if you take himseriously, the jawans assaulting Tiger Hill.

There are other dangers inherent in this psychology and one of these is asimplistic understanding of a soldier’s profession and his mind. Soldiersare human like us, they love their families and fear for their own safety.They walk the snipers’ alleys and minefields but they also mourn eachdeath.

They do not celebrate martyrdom the way we do in the movies. For most peopleof the kind that come to watch Fifty Day War, the fear of having a familymember serve with an army unit in Kashmir is quite unfamiliar.

Vajpayee did quite well as a leader during the Kargil war. He was rewardedfor this in the subsequent elections. He was also among the audience in oneof the shows a couple of weeks ago. But once state elections are over, hewould do well to put an end to the Kargil hype. It is confusing an entirenation to such an extent that even Kandahar has not shaken us out of ourcomplacency.

We don’t think of the coffins that return every day from Kashmir. We loveour soldiers. We celebrate their martyrdom. We buy their spent shellcasings. But we won’t send our sons to the Army. The great Indian MiddleClass is seized by a warped new militarism. If you need evidence, go and seeFifty Day War.