Thursday, February 14, 2013

Kandhar - Place Value, Perception & Truth An Analysis


Let's analyze How perception matters more than place value and how it can be molded ?


We were taking tea in the cold evening of 24th December 1999 when news flashed that IC 814 has been hijacked from Kathmandu Airport. This Airbus  A300 plane was full with 176 Indian passengers which ended up standing on the Kandahar Airport. Hijackers demanded more than 50 terrorists in jail to be released,asked for a big sum of money and safe passage.



We can see the geographical position of Afghanistan on the world map.Till then, Afghanistan was ruled by Taliban militia who felt proud to give shelter to the Islamic terrorists. NDA Government called an emergency meeting and all party meeting was also called. In that meet, Every party had the opinion that passenger's safety should be foremost agenda.

Hundreds of family members had come on road to pressurize the government ( In democracy Peoples' pressure does matter,In MMS democracy, Sonia's pressure does matter).

Now what were our options?





1. To send NSG commandos to rescue the plane.


2. To attack Afghanistan to teach a lesson to Taliban.
3. Not to release the terrorists and let the passengers die.(hypothetical)
4. to send some clerks along with the terrorists to Kandahar.
5. To negotiate with Taliban and hijackers.
6. To ask for help to other nations
7. Hope for some James bond character sitting in the plane.

Now, if we analyse them one by one.

Afghanistan is not a border state to India, to fly a military Aeroplane in the air space of Afghanistan,you need permission from Pakistan.We can simply say,that Pakistan could be attacked if it didn't allow the plane to use it's air space. Pakistan is a sovereign nation and it has right to shoot down any plane that is flying in it's air space without permission. If we would try this adventure, we would end up fighting a war with Pakistan.

We should see the situation at that time when 9/11 hadn't happened. We would not get support from any other nation for war against terror and would end up creating a perception that we are aggressors in spite of the place value of being attacked by Pakistani terrorists. In such situation,sending an aeroplane full of NSG guards was not possible.

To attack Afghanistan, we would need the airspace. Please note that USA which has quite an impressive arsenal,which can use it's aircraft carriers as military base to attack any nation in the world,if need be. USA has to also request for the airspace of Pakistan and it was called as an ally in war against terrorism.And,if we could do that,would it be justified to send thousands of soldiers in terrain about which they didn't know anything. After such a great fire power of US air force, they had to face a crisis of heavy causalities. It could be worse if thousands of dead bodies of Indian soldiers would come in the coffin.

India is a welfare state where person is important that country.That means that we don't justify death of people for the sake of the Nation.Government could not abandon them so easily and be tagged as insensitive and anti people. The same media which blames BJP for release of terrorists was putting pressure and creating peoples' perception to such level that some of the alliance partners would pull support to be protected from this perception.


Government would be sacrificed on this single issue, congress would be re elected and every thing would seem fine.


It is a travesty of justice that we don't remember when several terrorists where released just for the sake of the daughter of home minister Mufti Mohammad sayeed. How could a person with separatist views, could become a home minister of India, is in itself a subject of research.

We always hear,why the foreign minister had to accompany the terrorists..What would be the perception,if some clerks would be sent.There would be an issue that government is not taking the issue of safety of the passengers seriously. Isn't it praiseworthy that Jaswant Singh didn't bother about his own safety and went to a completely unsafe land to ensure the rescue of the passengers. He could have died. After the terrorists would walk free,they would have killed all passengers and the clerks,but due to the stature of INDIAN FOREIGN MINISTER they didn't do such things. For the first time in history, Indian government treated Indian citizens so well otherwise we have lots of examples when Somali pirates kidnap Indians and govt forgets them forever.

In congress regimes, India would never register even a meek protest, when there were anti Indian riots in many African countries.

To negotiate...this was the only option left to us due to all the compulsion of a state that has been soft to it's core. Government didn't surrender on their first call. It was stretched so their demands came down to three terrorists. Now there is a question to be asked..What were these terrorists doing idle in the jails of different parts of India. Why could the Congress government (remember,before BJP it was congress government) not prosecute them in time and if they would be hanged for their deeds.Who would the Hijackers demand for? What if another plane is hijacked and they ask for Afjal Guru (latest update is that he has been hanged (?).?



What could other nations do? Could they put diplomatic pressure on Afghanistan? It was not recognized by majority of the countries in this world excluding Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. So, this is ruled out.

It was pre 9/11 world where terrorism was still an struggle for justice.So,it was justified.They were openly called as freedom fighters.



So this idea of not releasing the terrorists was being projected as a Hardliner's view (Hindu Fascist and Blah Blah).If BJP could not manage to save those passengers, It's obituary would have been written then and there.




Now the hope for a james bond character from Hollywood. After watching several movies of Hollywood, we start fantasizing that there could be a character like him,who could enter the plane stealthily and would kill the bad guys.But,practically,it is next to impossible and when hundreds of citizens' lives are at stake,A mature government is not expected to be indulged in this type of adventure.




Now,if there are so many points to prove that BJP was not soft on terror,then why this perception prevails that we can't talk about the terror report of UPA because we didn't handle it well.

The main reason is that every body does not follow the facts through unbiased lense but they rely on Indian Media which is biased to the core.. So we have to fight against wrong perceptions.If media is not supportive, we will have to go to each and every house of India and convey our side of the story. We should develop an intelligentsia in the Indian system so they can create the right perception.


It is true that we should protect those people who are unbiased so they are not threatened to create wrong perception.Pioneer works to support BJP but still what's the reader's graph?



We need some channels and news papers which should be highly popular and we know that perception can be created by cracking a joke also..Why 'Rang de basanti' has hinduwadi neta being shown as a demon???? All this is part of the continuous Propaganda machinery running at different levels.

We need to counter this aggressively, Perception is always very important and it needs to be corrected. we have to ensure that we will never let any body write the obituary of politics of development and nationalism by the wrong perceptions created by opportunist class of society i.e Media,corrupt congress and their cronies.

Thanks. This article was earlier posted here

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brilliant Sir......
Isn't it praiseworthy that Jaswant Singh didn't bother about his own safety and went to a completely unsafe land to ensure the rescue of the passengers.

Nipun said...

super written

Anonymous said...

well written but just u r trying to save bjp and its leader. there is some lack ( i know that u forgot to metion those things intentionally.
1. about air space: do u think that afghanistan is totally surrounded by pakistan. do not u know that iran could provide air space if nda govt. asked bcz they have also problem with taliban and india and iran were in good terms(much better than today). we can also use airspace of tajikistan and uzbekistan.
2. do u know the same guy later made jaish-e-mohammad and one of them another group and other were very active in al-qaeda and killed more person than in the aeroplane.
3. as u said ki ye human ground tha but yhi chiz to hr jgh apply hota and aisa hi aksar hota rhe to uparwala hi maalik hai.
4. regarding jaswant singh there was no fear of life (interestingly u also denied fear bcz u mention that they can not attack on foreign minister. and other thing some times these sort of thing than govt. is sending there beurocrats.
5. who told u that bjp is hard on terrorism? these people r supporting a party whoch passed a resolution in to save a terrorist. and they r not asking to hang him though his hanging date was decleared on 31 march 2012 but later it was postponed bcz of unrest in punjab and protest of their supporter world wide. (read about rajaona) and bjp is silent.... there is some other point to...

Unknown said...

Dear Friend,

U raised some valid points and I would love to respond point wise.

1. here we are not discussing about hijack of a cargo plane which could be rescued by carpet bombing of Afghanistan and no country gives permission to attack any country for the sake of good relations. Don't forget India was not US and till congress is in power, it will never be.
2. It would be hypothetical that govt would presume the future attacks by these terrorists to not release them to trade with 176 passengers.
these terrorists are not some nuclear missile but rats,if not them, some other guy would made jaish-e- mohamed.
3. issue is not what could not happen but intention of Jaswant singh to lead from front even in such situation, if it would be congress, foreign minister would be holidaying in US.
4. BJP has ben in power just for 6 years which is not enough to convert a soft state to a pragmatic state.

Anonymous said...

reply for u again sarfraz ahsan khan
1. u talked about air space over pakistan so gave an alternative route. iran could be used as alternative route and iran can give it.
2. yes govt have to be futuristic. why can not they analyse. do not they know that they were very dreaed terrorist. if they can not analyse then they have no right to rule india.
3. then why u said these words about jaswant singh. ur imagination was just hypothetical but point is valid that these type of negotiation can be done by bureocrats too.
4. we india faced most attack on those days.
5. what about rajaona? why u left it again? r u afraid?

Anonymous said...

Great Thinking by a individual man.
kas hamari govt. b aisa hi sochti aur vote bank se uppar uatth kar hard decision leti to aaj Pakistan key andar hamara dar hota aur hame logo ko dammad nahi banana parta.