Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Why Label Terrorism?
The word “terrorist”, like the word “alien”, has come to represent a special category: and in labelling terrorists as terrorists, we tend to alienate them from the human community. They are “they” as against “us”, the “normal” human beings. This they/us binary is the sole cause behind the catastrophic terror attacks that took so many innocent lives in Mumbai. More dangerously, these terrorists again are identified as having particular religious affiliations! Incidentally, all the attackers have been found to belong to the Muslim community, a revelation that catapulted the media into labelling the attack on Mumbai as another example of Muslim terrorism, engineered by the infamous LeT. There is no harm in disclosing correct information to the public; but what is objectionable is the relentless labelling of this terror attack as Muslim. It is a current trend in the media to associate religion with violence. True, the Hindutva pogroms in Mumbai and Godhra have left deep sores in the soul of the subcontinent; but which Hindu script, which Hindu God teaches violence? The ideology of Hindutva is a new ideology which has nothing to do with traditional Hinduism, which is spectacularly tolerant. So, when the media identifies a Sadhvi Pragya as the new emerging face of Hindu militancy, it unwittingly paves path for other kinds of militancy in the name of religion. How fair is it to label a particular form of militancy as belonging to a particular religious community? If Sadhvi Pragya is the mastermind behind the Malegaon blasts in September 2008, it is not her religion which taught her to kill 31 innocent people. Similarly, if Muslim terrorists had infiltrated into the Taj Hotel and took several lives, it is not their religion which pleaded with them to do so! Therefore, what is the point in labelling a particular form of violence as Muslim, Hindu and Christian? Even if the offenders claim that they are indulging in riots, pogroms and terror attacks in the name of religion, it must be kept in mind there is no religion, neither Hindu nor Muslim, which endorses such inhuman acts. There is a particular group of people who are incidentally Hindu or incidentally Muslim who have a predilection to proclaim their supremacy in this world, at any expense whatsoever. Terror attacks or riots are nothing but power pageants in which innocent people are butchered. And since we never stop dissociating religion from these pogroms or terror attacks, all efforts to unite fall apart. If LeT incidentally belongs to Pakistan, there is no point in hating the country as a whole. If a saffron-clad group plans organized violence against people of the Muslim community, there is no point in thinking that all of India is hell-bent on wiping out the Muslims. Since the real originators of violence are never identified properly, and even if they are, their religious allegiance is so conspicuously highlighted, that anger of the common mass is directed towards a religious community as a whole or a country as a whole. This causes more alienation and fragmentation and of course, more violence. For how long would we continue to believe in divide and rule? It is not a Hindu that is a Muslim is sceptical of and vice-versa; it is a constructed image of a Hindu or a constructed image of a Muslim which is the source of fear. Let’s dissociate religion from terrorism once and forever!
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I recently went to College street just after the Mumbai attack and found a large crowd, gathered inside college square protesting the attack. Their rhetoric was uncannily violent and the speaker, a member of Hindu Sanhati, a fireband Hindu nationalist group, presented priviledges given to the minorities (in this case muslims)as the cause of this attack. He felt these people should be made aware of their minority status and needs to be "controlled" (he even went to the extent of criticizing people's sympathy for Rizwanur as he thought it humiliating for a "Hindu" to be bothered about injustice done to a "muslim", which supposedly is not big issue as Mumbai attack!). He made absurd comments like if there is a movement against Singur and Nandigram incidents then why any such protest had not been put forth by the intellectuals of this state (though I guess he has compensated enough for that!). But then the protest was against certain policies of the government machinary. Here who will protest against whom? Who is responsible for the attack, do we know? As it is evident from initial investigation none of the terrorists are actually from India. They are even funded from and trained outside the country. So the claim of the Hindu Sanhati leader that our own "Muslims" are responsible for this attack is baseless. You are absolutely right that we cannot homogenize hindus or muslims. However the easiest way to vent out one's anger is to focus it or project it into one particular person or perhaps one particular community. Well on this earth most people wants to eliminate otherness and very few of us actually learn to live with it. But then it is also not very often that we run behind other people's lives with an AK-47. If we can't lesrn to be tolerant to differences, we at least are forced to bear up with it. So even if the constructed image of the respective religions incites people to attack each other then to nourish that false desire for revenge and to provide them with arms and ammunition there must be some external support. I feel it is important to think who sustains and nourishes terrorism today rather than asking why some people would be eager to give up their lives in order to kill others. The easy answer to the latter question must be the deprivation and negligence towards the have not's shown by the so-called democratic states round the World. I feel since historically certain religious communities (like the muslims) or races (like the blacks)have suffered torture and subjugation and have been impoverished and since almost none of the Government have taken any successful step to eliviate the conditions of the poor, most of the nations states have been partially communal, racist and zingoist. So it is natural for the people of the deprieved communities to indulge into violence and rupture. This perhaps is the cause of the violences that happen during communal riots. But that can't be the cause of terrorism indeed. Communal violence is temporary and unregulated whereas terrorism is sustained, planned and organized. It works like a corporate network where huge transaction of money is involved and great many people work in order to fullfill an aim unknown to any one of them (I hope you remember the film Aamir). Surely, a lot of people must have been bribed to successfully accomplish the Mumbai attack. It is absurd to think the Muslim's of the star hotels selflessly helping out the attackers out of some pan-islamic patriotism paving their way in. It is nontheless easy to get it done in this way for a country like India where poverty is rampant and corruption has reached the threshold mark. Then who is the culprit? Surely the one who gets benifitted. Then who gets benifitted? After the Vietnam war there has been no major battle all over the world except those related to terrorism but it should be kept in mind experiment with war weopons have never stopped. If someone asks if there will be a World War III then my answer would be - well it has already started - it has started in the form of terrorism and involves almost all the major nations of the World. If the culture of attack and counter-attack continues, the war will go on and will eventually benifit the weapon industry throughout the World. Today if Carbines are obsolete to counter terrorist attack then AK47 or eben more advanced guns will be essential. If in the name of religion (that neing the nexus of enmity) neighbouring countries like India and Pakistan continues to fund terrorism eventually leading to another Indo-Pakistan war or if US is takes the charge of bombing Afghanistan to 'fight' terrorism then the weopon industry flourishes. So I smell something strongly fishy behind all this patriotic call to arms against terrorism, identifying it to be "Islamic". I am afraid in the process of questioning terrorism we might do something like to translate an oft-quoted Bangla phrase digging up the snake while looking for an Earthworm! So lets carefully handle it. Sorry for bothering u with such a long comment. Actually I was thinking on the same subject since last few days and so felt like sharing them with you after reading your article in the blog. - SAMRAT
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