Author: Swapan Dasgupta
Publication: Free Press Journal
Date: October 18, 2004
URL: http://www.samachar.com/features/181004-features.html
Human life in India is woefully
cheap, but some lives, it would seem, are cheaper than others. Last week,
on Gandhi Jayanti, there were serial bomb blasts and terrorist attacks
all over Assam and in Dimapur, the commercial hub of Nagaland. In just
two days, some 60 people added their names to the unending list of victims
of terrorism. Last Independence Day, an explosion in Dhemaji led to the
death of 16 schoolchildren. The timing device used for the blast was much
more sophisticated than anything the authorities have so far stumbled on.
As the incidents took place in Assam
and Nagaland, rather than in Bhiwandi or Begusarai-the catchment areas
of low-brow TV news channels-the outrage was predictably muted. Yes, the
Home Minister who had been repeatedly alerted to the threat by the IB,
did take the first special plane east and mouthed some inanities, a few
of which were even comprehensible. The former Home Minister, now the leader
of the Opposition, held a press conference about the UPA Government's mishandling
of internal security, which politically-correct editors relegated to less
than a column on the inside pages.
And there, apart from a one-day
controversy over the US Ambassador's surprise offer to call the FBI to
assist investigations, the national supply of crocodile tears ended. In
an act of colossal callousness, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, who has
sworn on affidavit that he is a permanent resident of Assam, did not deem
it necessary to visit the state that has provided him a Rajya Sabha berth
for two terms. No one berated him for this astonishing lapse.
Our dominant sense of nationhood
these days appears to be determined by a blend of North Indian mofussil
insularity and noveauriche cretinism. In this hierarchy of values, the
North-east comes somewhere near the bottom of the heap. The region has
become synonymous with a thousand insurgencies waged by mysterious outfits,
known only by their acronyms. It has become synonymous with grandiose announcements
by successive prime ministers of many thousand- crore packages that disappear
without trace, leaving a handful of political brokers very rich.
And in the Indian bureaucracy, a
posting in the North-east is treated on par with incarceration in Siberia.
Unwilling, homesick these babus are prone to callousness. In the months
to come, it is possible that the problems of the North-east may be injected
with a dash of glamour and even find their way into the proceedings of
conflict-resolution workshops sponsored by angst-ridden Scandinavians and
shady Americans foundations. That's not because there is a sudden realisation
that the problems of this part of the world have been neglected for too
long and that it is time to make amends. Life, unfortunately, is not all
that innocent.
Washington (and let's face it, it
is the US alone that matters) isn't interested in the Assamese or Bodo
insurgents because of some over-weaning desire to destabilise India, as
the Left loonies believe, or promote Christianity in the region, as the
Hindu alarmists feel. The suggestions are flattering but simply untrue.
It's offer of FBI assistance was
prompted by the recognition that Bangladesh, like Indonesia, Malaysia and
Thailand, is becoming an important outpost of radical Islamism outside
the Arab world. In a tangential way, the terrorist problems in North-east
India have become linked to the security of the US. There are three separate
problems in the region.
The first centres on insurgent groups
whose activities cover a wide swathe of territory from Nepal to Myanmar.
These groups in turn are linked to the heart of India through terror groups
like the People's War, whose leaders are now being feted as state guests
by the Congress government of Andhra Pradesh. More to the point, these
groups are now nurtured by the state apparatus in Bangladesh, a development
that dates back to the installation of the Khaleda Zia government in 2001.
The second problem is the network
of madarsas covering the Terai belt, Assam, West Bengal and Bangladesh.
These madarsas have served as facilitation centres for the indoctrination
and military training given to at least 5,000 Assamese Muslims in Bangladesh
and, in some cases, Pakistan.
They form a reserve army of jihadis.
Finally, there is the unchecked illegal immigration from Bangladesh that
has led to the border districts of Bihar, West Bengal and Assam becoming
Muslim-majority zones. The problem is not new and the process has been
continuing since the 1960s. However, as the furore over the recent exercise
in religious demography so vividly demonstrated, the problem has assumed
absolutely alarming proportions.
There is now a corridor extending
from the border districts of West Bengal and Bihar to the border districts
of Assam where the illegal immigrants from Bangladesh exercise a strategic
clout. A possibly alliance of the indigenous Muslim population with the
Bangladeshi migrants could have an explosive impact on future developments
in eastern India.
The past three years have seen the
three strands coming together under a proverbial unified command based
in Bangladesh but remote-controlled from Islamabad. It is this grand alliance
of North-eastern insurgents, radical Islamists and the Bangladesh Government
that has made the threat to national security more potent. The categorical
statements by Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Home Minister Shivraj
Patil pinning responsibility for the blasts on the ISI, have to be viewed
in this light. However, pinning Pakistan down is going to be difficult
because the operations have been conducted with what the intelligence agencies
call a "high degree of deniability."
After Punjab and Kashmir, we are
seeing the rapid evolution of another insurgency aimed at bleeding India.
It is also aimed at ensuring the shift of some of India's defence capability
from the border with Pakistan to the border with Bangladesh. The fall of
the Taliban in Afghanistan resulted in Pakistan losing its strategic depth.
The disadvantage is sought to be mitigated by the creation of a second
front for India.
Of course, the challenges will be
fought met gusto. But the robustness of India's response will be greater
if the national attitude to the problems of the North-east isn't laced
with either indifference or condescension. We also need to set our own
house in order.
The killings in Assam and Nagaland
aren't a part of some obscure and remote problem. They have a direct bearing
on our future in Delhi and Mumbai.
