The making of a sniper

The sniper in Washington had killed ten and injured three. That these were random killings had caused deep fear and insecurity among people in the capital of the world’s most powerful democratic state. The fact that the US had barely recovered from the shootings in schools and the phenomenon of 9/11 hardly helps it cope with this new form of challenge to civilised norms. There is obviously little connection with the phenomenon of terrorism across the globe, from Bali and Moscow to the Americas, and the lone sniper, except the means of killing. Massive quantities of so-called small arms and light weapons have diffused into society outside of governmental control across the world over the past two decades.

Proxy wars during the Cold War led to large quantities of sophisticated military-specification weapons being transferred without discretion or end-use controls. The collapse of states and retrenchment of militaries in many parts of the world led to weapons moving out of governmental control. Sophisticated weapons were consciously supplied to religious non-state actors by governments for fighting covert wars. In J&K, sophisticated weapons sufficient to equip a couple of army divisions with modern arms, have been discovered. The UN has been seized of the problem of the proliferation of military specification weapons into the hands of non-state actors. The obvious answer to dealing with violence in society is to bring about tighter controls over weapons.

India has a good law to control and manage weapons in society. But the powerful have found ways to get around it. Wherever it has not been implemented properly, violence has surfaced in a more manifest way — as evident in Bihar. Pakistan, incidentally, has the same law but it is implemented extremely poorly; and the result has been there for all to see. Domestic terrorism and ethno-sectarian violence, which has dominated its life, feeds heavily on the eight million uncontrolled weapons diffused into society. The obvious answer is to restore the traditional monopoly of the state over instruments of violence. In fact, the Arms Control Act should be revised to further restrict the issue of licences. The traditional reasons for the granting of licences for even non-prohibited non-military calibres — that of self-defence, sport and display — are no longer valid in today’s life. Tighter legislative controls and effective implementation would make for a more peaceful society.