E-Paper
Cruel intentions
It's unlikely that violence in Srinagar was linked with carnage unleashed in Mumbai few hours later. Both targeted the common man of India.
It’s unlikely that Tuesday’s violence in Srinagar was connected to the carnage unleashed in Mumbai a few hours later. If there was one searing connection between the two ghastly events, it was this: both targeted the common man of India. Jammu and Kashmir, for those who perpetrated the dastardly act, is not a geographical location where people live and want to lead a ‘normal life’. For these criminals, the Valley represents an issue and an issue alone, regardless of its people and their wishes. Which is why the 2002 J&K assembly elections, a turning point in terms of underlining the democratic credentials of polls conducted in the state, had been so unsettling for those whose purpose was to continue projecting the Valley as a violence-torn region. The high turn-out of voters in the April 2006 byelections again confirmed the public mood in J&K.
Tuesday’s grenade attacks that claimed the lives of eight tourists has to be seen as a desperate attempt by terrorists to send out the message that, despite the resurgence of ‘normalcy’, the Valley is a dangerous place. What this latest tragedy will entail for India-Pakistan relations is too early to say. But one must realise two things: first, this is not a home-grown terrorist attack retaliating against security forces’ atrocities and high-handedness as in the Nineties. Upsetting one of the economic lifelines of the Valley — tourism — does no good for the local population. Two, the Government of India cannot be seen to do nothing after Tuesday’s attack. In fact, while cool heads in New Delhi may desperately want to keep the CBM boats with Pakistan steady, the people of India, of Jammu and Kashmir in particular, will understandably bristle at the thought of pleasant rhetoric while bodybags are being counted.
Kashmir being the ‘veteran’ of terrorism in India should not in anyway lessen the need to act and act strongly against the murderers. If anything at all, the macabre coincidence of the violence unleashed in Srinagar and Mumbai should make New Delhi more resolute in its fight against terror.
