Responses to Terror

Editorial:
Today is 9/11, the tenth anniversary of that infamous 9th of September back in 2001 when the developed nations, following the coordinated strikes in USA, held up terror as a global enemy. While most are not comfortable with Uncle Sam’s aggressive ways post-9/11, there is no denying the fact that the crackdown on international terrorism got some teeth with the investment of American dollars. Initially, nations ignored for long by even their neighbours, were all of a sudden finding themselves surrounded by sympathisers in the fight against home-grown extremists who were increasingly exporting their services. Even Pakistan was forced to publicly crackdown on terrorist outfits it has sponsored in India. But a decade is a long time, and although Osama bin Laden is now no more, terror remains and old habits are proving difficult to change. The mistakes that individual countries were making in their responses to extremism were repeated on a global scale and these served only to deepen divisions.
Our country has suffered much in the hands of the dealers of terror. Countless lives, including two prime ministers, fell to their bullets. The assassination of the Father of the Nation was also an act of terrorism. And there is the bomb set off outside Delhi High Court yesterday. Delhi resembles a military cantonment even on routine days, and yet, terror manages to coordinate strikes there. There can be no guarantees for security, but that does not mean that meaningful efforts should not be made reinforce it. More barricades, more invasive identification and even more playing up of pro and anti forces against each other, do not, however, present solutions and create only harassment and resentment. India should know this well because this has been the nation’s experience of terror and the responses to it. As a nation, we occupy a unique position from where our policy-makers manage to achieve the impossible, be both, soft and excessive in its handling of “terror”. In fact, it is so confused between the two responses that a draconian Act in Manipur for the past more than five decades [AFSPA is of 1958 vintage] has failed to end “extremist” activities in the State.
Special Powers are for extreme times. Its life is supposed to be short and effectiveness quick and decisive. The Armed Forces [Special Powers] Act in Manipur is neither. Only the people seem to have suffered under it and yet the Centre is not willing to repeal or even review it. Had this hard-line approach been consistent, one might have tried to understand the ideology behind it, but our nation continues to be a study in vacillation. The Centre is convinced that Manipur needs the Act for its own security, but does an about-turn on national security at which level India does not have any specific legislation in place to combat terrorism. This duality of intent continues to defeat any attempt at curbing sponsored violence in the country. For a country which has grappled with terrorism in some form or the other ever since its inception in 1947, this is a completely indefensible situation. But that is how things are and can be expected to remain till such time that our politicians keep themselves so busy settling personal and political scores that the nation’s requirements keep getting deferred.