எச்சரிக்கை: இந்தியாவின் உட்பகை (enemy within)

ரவி ஸ்ரீனிவாஸ் அரசியல் கைதிகள்-பினாயக் சென்-அ.மார்க்ஸ்: ஒரு எச்சரிக்கைக் குறிப்பு என்ற தனது பதிவில் அப்பட்டமான இந்திய விரோதிகளுக்குப் பரிந்து பேசும் அறிவுஜீவி மனநிலை குறித்து சரியான கண்ணோட்டத்தை முன்வைத்திருக்கிறார். துரதிர்ஷ்ட வசமாக, "அரசியல் கைதி" என்று பரிவுடன் அவர் குறிப்பிடும் டாக்டர் பினாயக் சென் அமைதிப் புறா அல்ல. அப்பட்டமான தீவிர நக்சல் ஆதரவாளர் அவர் என்பதே உண்மை.

"உறுதியான சட்டங்கள், தேர்ந்த உளவுத்துறை, அதிநவீன பாதுக்காப்பு சாதனங்கள் இவை மட்டுமே ஜிகாதிகள், நக்சலைட்டுகள், மற்ற பிரிவினைவாதிகளுடனான போரில் நமக்கு வெற்றி தேடித் தராது.. தேசவிரோதிகளுக்காகக் கச்சை கட்டிக்கொண்டு பேசவரும் இத்தகைய உட்பகைகளையும் நாம் எதிர்கொள்ளவேண்டும். பயங்கரவாதத்தால் பாதிக்கப் படுபவர்களுக்குப் பதிலாக, பயங்கரச் செயலை நிகழ்த்தியவர்களின் பாதுகாப்பையும், நலனையும் முன்நிறுத்தும் இந்த இழிவான மனநிலை, அதன் பிரதிநிதிகள் இந்த விரோதிகளுடன் போரிட்டு முதலில் நாம் வெல்ல வேண்டும்" என்கிறார் பயனியர் ஆசிரியர் சந்தன் மித்ரா.

Jaipur to Raipur - பயனியர் இதழில் வந்த கட்டுரை.

Jaipur to Raipur
- Chandan Mitra

From Jaipur to Raipur and beyond, India is under a siege within. While the political class has predictably fulminated against Pakistan and Bangladesh, the fact is that every heinous crime against the people of India has been committed by Indians, even if funded and trained by outside forces.

For the ordinary citizen it comes as no solace to learn that something called HuJI has replaced LeT or JeM as the new face of terror in India. For the victims of terror, the jihadi terrorist remains an elusive, sinister figure irrespective of nomenclature. Periodically we are told that these shadowy organisations receive logistic support from yet another dangerous outfit, SIMI (or is it now called SIM?). Whether it is the Students' Islamic Movement that acts as the liaison agency for the executors of bomb blasts, it is quite inconsequential to the public at large. Jihadi terrorists have demonstrated their ability to strategise precisely, plan meticulously, strike at will and massacre innocents at destinations chosen by them. Every year India has reeled under three or more major terrorist outrages and just when complacency sets in, jihadis strike yet another deadly blow.

Where does Raipur fit in this scheme? Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and parts of Maharashtra and Karnataka have similarly been reeling under successive waves of terror of another kind. Although there is no concrete evidence yet of links between jihadis and Maoists, they share a common aim -- destabilisation of the Indian nation. The green flag of Islamic jihad and red pennant of Naxalites are fluttering virtually all over the country even if they have carved out separate areas of operation, the former focusing more on big cities and the latter on interior villages. The numbers decimated by Maoist marauders is probably no less than those felled by terrorist depredations. In vast stretches of the Indian heartland, the writ of the Government either does not run at all or runs cursorily only between dawn and dusk. Just as the jihadi terrorists are working in coordination with, or at the behest of, foreign powers and global terror outfits like Al Qaeda, Maoists in India too have a central command, swear allegiance to a foreign ideology and, after the tragic legitimisation of ultra-Left rule through elections in Nepal, will work in even greater concert with a neighbouring country's Government.

The similarity does not end there. Both jihadis and Maoists thrive on the back-up support of an army of secular fundamentalists and bleeding-heart intellectuals in India. These fifth columnists hold opinion makers in this country in an octopus-like grip, and are perpetually busy generating sympathy for the mass murderers. While every attempt by the state to act decisively against both jihadis and Naxalites is greeted with howls of protest, law-enforcement agencies are continuously berated and sought to be systematically demoralised. The self-styled cheerleaders of liberalism oppose the demand to bring back POTA or enact similar State laws needed to act aggressively against terror merchants.

Further, they are at the forefront of vicious campaigns against conscientious security personnel for their alleged excesses and so-called violation of human rights. One only has to recall their frenzied attempts to put Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on the mat for defending his police in the encounter that led to the fully justified liquidation of jihadi operatives such as teenage terror courier Ishrat Jahan. The subversive section of the Indian intelligentsia went almost berserk over the alleged crimes of VG Vanzara, the Gujarat police officer who eliminated terrorist Sohrabuddin. These effete intellectuals have been out to prove that the Government itself plotted the December 13 attack on Parliament and Afzal Guru is an innocent, honourable man who must be saved from the gallows irrespective of judicial verdicts. The India-baiters inevitably succeed because we are unfortunate enough to have a Prime Minister who confesses he could not sleep for nights without end worrying about the fate of an Indian-origin Glasgow airport bombing suspect detained briefly in Australia, although the same Prime Minister has shown no such concern for the thousands of his fellow-countrymen who die gruesome deaths at the hands of jihadis and Maoists.

Not surprisingly, closet sympathisers of India's destabilisation have now mounted a campaign to allow Naxalite intellectual Dr Binayak Sen to travel to Washington to personally collect something called the Jonathan Mann award from an organisation that describes itself as the Global Health Council. Apparently he is to be honoured for his "spectacular and pioneering" work among tribals of Chhattisgarh and also for "exposing" the "Government-backed vigilante group, Salwa Judum". It is remarkable how a Washington-based organisation came to know about Dr Sen's "spectacular" work when nobody in India (except Maoists and their frontal organisations) had heard of him, at least till he was caught smuggling vital correspondence to a Naxalite leader in detention, under the garb of attending to his medical condition. Moreover, the Goebblessian propaganda that Salwa Judum is a vigilante group, whereas it is an unarmed people's movement against Naxalites, has actually got embedded even in intelligent people's minds through sheer repetition. Although various agitations planned on the dubious doctor's behalf by Maoists and their fellow-travellers have not quite taken off despite high voltage publicity on websites, it would be naïve to rule out a crescendo of support as May 29, the date on which the award is to be conferred, comes closer.

Remarkably, Indian subversives have a huge international network, which includes various separatist outfits, Christian missionary groups and busybody NGOs. I recall being confronted by an earnest young Tamilian Christian student at Berkeley last August demanding my intervention as MP with the "fascist, communal" Chhattisgarh Government for Dr Sen, whose name I first heard at that seminar. Taken aback, I checked up with friends at home about the activist-doctor's antecedents that night and sparred with his misguided young supporters in the US thereafter. I have no doubt that India's terror network thrives because of such people. I even came across an article titled "India: No country for good men" detailing the Government's apparently disgraceful human rights record and condemning the "systematic crackdown" on dissenters in this country. If India were not mentioned a few times, anybody would have thought it was a write-up on the excesses of the Burmese military junta! Needless to add, the internet article was written by an Indian!

Thus, the siege within is much more pervasive than it appears at first sight. While the country needs more stringent anti-terror laws, better intelligence, superior equipment for security forces and other paraphernalia for combating jihadi, Maoist and separatist terror, apart from draconian measures to stop infiltration from Bangladesh, the war against the enemy within cannot be won by laws alone.

Till such time as we agree that "terrorism in all its manifestations" includes mindset that in effect protect and promote the cause of the perpetrators of terror rather than those of its victims, I am afraid the war can never be decisively won.