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.
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
