mumbai
4 Dec 2008
A Shared Future
Hardliners on both sides of the India-Pakistan border stand to benefit from the Mumbai attacks. Shakira Hussein looks at the internal political reverberations of the bombings
When times are bad, conspiracy theories become ever more lurid. My favourite conspiracy theorist in the wake of 9/11 was the Pakistani man who announced gravely that "The attack was conducted by George Bush — the father. He wanted to test the mettle of his son."Now, as the city of Mumbai mourns its dead, voices in the Pakistani media and blogosphere are talking about a "Hindu Zionist" plot. According to this account, the killers were not Pakistani, or even Muslim. The attack was a joint operation between Mossad and the Hindu nationalist RSS. The dead Hindus and Jews were just collateral damage — the aim of the attacks was to turn world opinion against Muslims and Pakistan.
In fact, extremists of all varieties stand to benefit from the Mumbai attacks. As tension rises between India and Pakistan, Pakistani officials have threatened to move troops away from the "war on terror" in the north, and towards the Indian border. And in India, with the ruling Congress party already looking shaky in the run-up to next year's elections, the opposition Hindu nationalist party BJP is accusing the Government of being "soft on terrorism".
But the BJP is rather selective in its attitude to terrorism. According to its leadership, the real problem is that the Indian authorities have recently been preoccupied with chasing the wrong sort of terrorist — Hindus instead of Muslims. Over the past few weeks, the Indian authorities have arrested a number of Hindu militants over a bombing in Malegaon which was reportedly aimed at "making India like what it was when it was ruled by the Aryans".
The same accused terrorists were said to be responsible for other attacks in Ajmer and Hyderabad and for the bashing of a Christian pastor in Pune. Most sensationally, in one court hearing they were accused of involvement in the 2007 bombing of the Samjhauta ("Friendship") Express train between Delhi and Lahore — an attack which the Indian authorities had previously blamed on the Pakistani intelligence agency (ISI).
The alleged link between the Hindu network and the Samjhauta bombing was later downplayed, but the Pakistani media is citing this episode as evidence of the inherent untrustworthiness of the Indian authorities and their tendency to make unsubstantiated accusations against Pakistan.
The BJP and other Hindu nationalist organisations flocked to the side of the Malageon accused, claiming that they had been tortured and were being set up in order to court the Muslim vote. Now, they are claiming that the investigation into the alleged Hindu terrorist network distracted law enforcement agencies from the Muslim threat and the plans for the attack on Mumbai.
Among those killed in this week's attacks was Hemant Karkare, the head of the Maharashtra anti-terrorism squad. Over the past few weeks, Karkare had come under savage attack from Hindu nationalist politicians for his investigation into the Malageon network. In the week before his death, police were investigating a threat to bomb his home.
The Chief Minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi, (widely held to be implicated in the 2002 massacre of an estimated 1000 Muslims during communal violence in his home state) attacked Karkare as "anti India". This week, Modi arrived, uninvited, at Karkare's home to offer sympathy and financial compensation to his family. The compensation was refused.
Extremism feeds extremism, as is no doubt the intention. With each attack, each bombing, each massacre, reconciliation becomes more and more difficult — but also more and more necessary. If the BJP is returned to office next year on a hardline Hindu nationalist platform, it will not bode well for any peace process with Pakistan. And Pakistanis cannot afford to have their attention diverted towards the "external" threat of India when Pakistan itself faces so many internal crises.
India and Pakistan share a common history, and even though their paths have diverged widely since 1947, they also share a common future. Whatever happens in one society will inevitably echo within the other. And right now, the echoes are ominous.
Delicious
Digg
StumbleUpon
Reddit
Newsvine
Facebook
Kwoff
Discuss this article
To participate in the discussion Sign in or Register
How come we never get to read this stuff in the mainstream Aussie press? Do Aussie journos and editors find English-language newspapers in India too hard to read?
I agree - you don’t read about this stuff. Since the Mumbai bombings, I have been sent several links about these theories of Hindus being behind the attacks. You really have to read a wide array of different sources to understand anything. We can’t rely on the Australian media for indepth comment on foreign affairs, especially regarding Pakistan and India :-(
It’s the same no matter what the issue is and frequently this keeps potential issues from ever becoming an issues at all when the media won’t pick up on it.
We’re up against government and media working 24/7 against writers like us doing our best to be read in the letters columns writing for an hour a day.
So many concerns like an out-of-Sydney-overflow-airport & Fast train, No desalination plant, no nuclear reactor, no exposure of the new Lucas Heights reactor Lemon they can’t make to run or be reimbursed for, no uranium mining or selling over seas, expanded port facilities, our international airport & now the desalination plant all congested in the one Botany bottleneck! There is no real access to any of these issues. No chance to speak with ministers who say they will get back & never do and the media simply refuse to publish!
Renewable energy is being throttled by big business and Rudd is letting it happen. We could have been well down the track to all out solar power, wind power & thermal power by now but Kevin is taking the middle road not daring to touch on the dreaded nuclear power…well if you don’t want it Kevin, we would love to hear you say so…don’t be gutless, spell it out…no nuclear power!
Brian Johnson Gymea
If your theory is right Shakira, then that means not one of the terrorists uttered "Allah akba" and the extremist Hindus have now turned on the Jews, as well as the Christians and Muslims!
I don’t think so!
But I certainly won’t rule it out until the joint Indian/Pakistan inquiry into the event is further advanced.
The only people I know who ever screamed "Allah Akba" were the authors of the Lindsay pamphlet.
Shakira,
Thank you for an excellent story.
The conspirationists can all very well be summed up as a world wide conspiracy of horses’ derrieres.
I am reminded of the story of Jack the giant killer.
To refresh the memory: Jack sees the two giants lying asleep under a huge tree. Jack climbs up and throws down a stone at one of the sleeping giants, who is awakened and immediately accuses the other of disturbing his sleep. The other tells him to go back to sleep he must be dreaming.
Then Jack throws a stone at the other giant who wakes up and is furious at being reawoken, and slaps the first giant and accuses hoim of instigating the strife and blaming him. Naturally there is an allmighty fracas and the two giants kill each other and nearly Jack when they knock down the tree onto themselves.
The moral of the story is: To destroy giants you don’t need to be one yourself, just a bit cunning, and very foolhardy.
For Jack read Islamic terrorism, for giant 1 read India, for giant 2 read Pakistan. For the tree and the stones read into them what you like. The global chessboard has become very complicated.
Whatever the media is saying or not saying, the torture and deliberate murder of innocent citizens,(may god comfort their loved ones) exacts a form of retribution which is unstoppable and almost unimaginable.
God help us all.
Tzvi
Amy, the simplest thing to do is to read foreign newspapers directly, e.g. I read expressindia.com for India and dawn.com for Pakistan. I get blogger commentary from pakistaniat.com and also read the Indian think-tank southasiaanalysis.org.
But as for the conspiracy theories which attribute the Mumbai attacks to Hindu extremists… that’s paranoia, not enlightenment. I would caution you to look beyond whatever your sources there may be. In the Malegaon bombings, which Shakira Hussein mentions, Indian Muslims were the victims, and so it was always possible that a radical Hindu group was behind them. But the Mumbai attacks were merely the latest of a series in which mujahideen claimed responsibility, and this time they were even on TV saying as much. Conspiracies do happen, but there is a point at which conspiracy theory become arbitrary supposition and outright denial of reality.
The attack was terrible, but yet again India will have to wear it. The last thing India wants is a failed nuclear Pakistan state on its western border - or should I say an even more failed Pakistan …
MICHAEL
Shakira, this is a very interesting article. I agree with your thoughts and the facts mentioned are true and valid. If you look at the history of indo-pak, both nations have been quick to blame each other for any terrorism related activities. It’s easy to blame Pakistan in this instance to calm down the angry mob in Mumbai. After fighting 6-7 years war with extremists (Taliban) at their northern fronts, the last thing Pakistan needs is an open front with the Indian Army. I believe there are some elements which exist in this troubled region who would never allow piece and glory for either nation.
I must say to conclude my comments; "In a war, a loser or a winner, both lose in some way or other".