Land of the dead...

Just finished watching a documentary called "Dispatches- Terror in Mumbai", about the 26/11 terror attacks.
And though a lot has already been said and read about it, people seem to have forgotten a little too quickly.
10 ordinary youngsters forced the world's largest democracy on its knees, raped her for 60 hours constantly and then got themselves shot in an act of "martyrdom". And while all this was on, the rest of the nation were glued to their television sets, starving for every new update about the situation.

Nobody realizes trouble until they are face to face with it. And when they are in trouble, they save their skin before anyone else's. And while I m highly supportive of this kind of selfishness, I began pondering over what prompted Karambir Singh Kang, general manager of hotel Taj Mahal, to put the safety of his customers before that of his own family. Or what made Hemant Karkare to risk his life on a defective bullet-proof in order to direct his men and save the city under siege.
Both these heroes suffered unrepairable losses. While Kang lost every single member of his family, Karkare lost every single bit of his soul. Kang was awarded for his bravery and sincerity, and forgotten to spend the rest of his life in solitude.
Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone terrorist captured amongst those 10, is still alive, three years later, is in the pink of his health, thanks to the nourishment and special cell that Govt. of India has provided to him. All his food is tasted first by the jail authorities before being sent to him to prevent poisoning. Making a mockery of our judicial system, he has repeatedly admitted to being handled by Pak officials and Lashkar-e-Taiba. President Zardari had even issued a secret memo after the terror attacks, ordering quick apprehension to those related to the attack. The memo never saw the light of the day and Pakistan intelligence still laughs at the evidence India has provided.
Bhagvad Geeta allows killing a person if the said person is a fatal risk to your family or yourself. And yet, the Kasab is ages away from the hangman's noose. Under the pretext of extracting information, he was kept alive for three whole years. India forgot what he did and Indians forgot what they suffered. I wouldnt be surprised if the judiciary had to let go of him in case of lack of convincing evidence.
Why?? Why are we so bloody weak-minded and incompetent? Why does it take an attack in our heart to react? And why are we not able to stand with confidence and capability? Our arms and weapons are outdated in every respect and our intel bureaus are no more than escorts of an ageing police force. It takes us 40 hours to send down Special Forces when terror strikes the most important city of India. And it takes us forever to prosecute a man who was captured on video, killing 56 people and injuring numerous others.
One would have expected security measures to improve ten-fold in India, a la USA. But no! One can still easily blast a hole right through CST with nothing more than a pound of RDX or crude soap-bombs.
Our neighboring nations take our nobility for granted, our citizens dont give a shit about their own nation, our politicians are covered upto their necks in money and our police is taking bribes just to make their ends meet. Our women cant roam around without a male accomplice. Our media is so foolish that they unwittingly provide live footage of security operations to the terror masterminds outside India. We are so used to seeing dead bodies in daily news that we dont flinch on "ordinary" murders now.
And we are so damn fickle-minded that we believe anything and everything. We can kill and get killed for ridiculous reasons like caste, injustice, region and religion. Had I been an honest Indian, I would have cried at such a pathetic situation of what was once the pinnacle of wealth and wisdom in this world.

 

Sadly, I am NOT! AND SO AREN'T THE REST OF US!

We tweet, we blog, we SMS and we sit back. The terrorists held a Turkish couple hostage inside the Taj and when the couple started reciting verses from Quran, they let them live... All around, the victims had only one question to Kasab and gang- What did we do to you?