Comment

The worst aspects of the terror attacks on Mumbai on November 26 were the number of people who died and who were injured, the ferocity and audacity of the attackers and their plan, the utter inadequacy of our administration and security establishment and the subsequent inabilities and stupidities of our political classes.

One cannot get positives out of such an event, but perhaps there is some small hope in the amount of public outrage expressed. If the anger against politicians can be used politically to demand more accountability, then some progress will be made.

But together with that hope-ishfeeling is a disquieting amazement. Having written about and against Hindutva for years I am inured to hate mail — from “you fat Bongo stuffing samosas in your mouth”, to “you will be punished”, to “who are you to say Pravin
Togadia is wrong” and so on. I understand where the anger is coming from and all too often laugh.

But now my laughter is tinged with scorn. All this middle class self-loathing. All this breast-beating about how no one cares when the poor die but when the rich are affected then there is general outrage. Does an attack as horrific as this have to be trivialised so fast and so easily?

Were the 329 people who died when the Kanishka (an aeroplane, for those who may have forgotten) was blown up in 1985 not of all social classes? The bomb blasts of 1993 took place at 13 locations across Mumbai, including the Air India building, the stock market building, Sea Rock Hotel, the passport office, Centaur hotel, Plaza theatre. South Bombay locations? Check. Rich and powerful people? Check.

Other people as well? Check.Nor was this the first time that South Bombay was jolted into action. That was 1992-93, after the riots. No, we have been here before. This time, though, it just seemed like we’d had enough. The issue is not of who died — surely all human lives lost is a pity — or where they died — surely the symbolism of the Taj and Oberoi we can all understand — but of why they died and why we allowed them to die so easily.

The issue for us must be of governance and lack of it. How many times have we heard that same meaningless guff from our leaders — something will be done, the perpetrators will be caught? What have they really done about it? Why did our intelligence fail
us so hopefully? How can all these agencies get into these he-did-it-not-me games so shamelessly? And what are we going to do about it?

But no, our middle class e-mailing community is raving about the media, about the lack of TV coverage about the deaths at the railway station (okay guys, reach for the remote, hit mute and read a newspaper), about how no one cares when the poor die. I’ll tell you something — it’s true. Every journalist worth his or her salt knows that a journal filled with news about malnutrition, oppression and doom and gloom is read by nobody.

What is the circulation of that fine journal, Economic and Political Weekly? A few thousands? Now don’t lie and say that you read it regularly. Only a few people in India — or anywhere in the world — are interested in these serious issues. Babies have been dying of malnutrition long before these attacks.

Why are you crying for them now? Didn’t you know? The terrorists know. They know they have to attack symbols to make maximum impact. They made their point. Our question is: are we going to let them get away with it? Or are we going to start this tawdry sentimental weeping? Are we going to hysterical about some ditzy TV anchors?

Worse, are we now going to get caught up in the morass of Indian sectarianism? Was it a Hindu-Zionist plot? Are all Indian Muslims secret jihadists? Please, let us not get absurd. Once we start fighting over whether the Sangh Parivar is worse than the Islamic jihadis (they’re both ghastly), we’re lost and the terrorists have won.