"So I’m booking flights to Mumbai. I’m going to go get a beer at the Leopold, stroll over to the Taj for samosas at the Sea Lounge, and watch a Bollywood movie at the Metro"Thanksgiving break is coming to an end and I feel like I've lived through a few lifetimes in the last few days. My heart and spirit have been thousands of miles away from Alpine, New Jersey and there isn't a cell in my body that is looking forward to taking a train ride back to Providence tomorrow morning. It's been hard having to sit down to write final papers, study for final exams and try and be a Brown student knowing that Bombay and the nation at large are suffering through nights of insecurity and anguish.
I have read hundreds of blogs, spoken to dozens of friends and relatives in India, trawled through every online news source and watched NDTV 24x7 (pun intended) during the past few days - hoping and praying that the words people were using to express their reactions to the events in Bombay would in some way, shape or form allow me to come to terms with my own sentiments. Anger and sadness have somewhere along the line metamorphosed into a deep-set sense of disappointment and melancholy. The victims of my wild emotions are also dynamic - religious leaders, terrorist groups, blinded youth, colonial powers, academics, insensitive peers, over-cautious older people, politicians, journalists, socialites and celebrities, friends, society, we the people...the world.
***
Crimson streets, broken-glass vision, blaring sirens, burning heritage, ruthless AK's, frightened pigeons, smiling terror. Wednesday and Thursday are a blur of tears. CNN America, usually SO careful to hide images of injured civilians in Iraq or mangled bodies of American/British soliders, had no qualms about displaying before its viewers graphic images of the blown up, bullet-ridden, fire-blackened, forever paralysed bodies of Indian men, women and children. Mumbaikers. The Taj burned late into the night and something broke inside of me.
Oh god, I was so angry. I was angry at those men who sit in their plush homes in Dubai, Karachi, Riyadh, Mumbai, London, Paris (you name it) and plot these atrocious acts. I was angry because I was living in a mad, screwed up world where bad people can band together, and truly believe that they are soldiers in "The Army of the Righteous" (Lashkar-e-Toiba). I was angry at people who, barely 48 hours the horrific acts, were posting, on facebook, conspiracy theories linking the attacks to the BJP. I was angry that, after calling me and asking if everyone was OK in my family, one of my friends would respond to my rhetorical questions, "Why Bombay? Why terror? Why AGAIN?!" with, "I mean, Muslims are treated pretty shittily in India...and plus there's the whole Kashmir thing". I was SO angry, in fact, that an Army friend's status message on facebook (“Forgiving terrorists is left to GOD, but fixing their appointment with god is OUR responsibility”) gave me some sick sense of pleasure. The knowledge that inhuman forms of torture were, no doubt, being used by the special forces on the body and spirit of the captured terrorist didn't appall me as much as it maybe should have. Admittedly, I was unbearably hateful.
***
The dust settled around the, yet again, bruised and battered city of Bombay, the Tiranga-draped bodies of Hemant Karkare, Ashok Kamte, Vijay Salaskar and other lesser-known but (god knows) equally important national heroes were laid to rest by tearful masses, cellphones were turned on, window shutters opened and frightened feet ventured outdoors. Life risked going back to normal. As it always does, in this compulsively resilient city. But something had broken.
***
I was watching the latest episode of "We The People" (if you haven't seen it already - here is the online version) and I was struck by a number of things. Firstly, could Barkha Dutt and her team have put together a more inept panel of speakers? People like Kunal Kohli, Ness Wadia and Simi Grewal - besides having no public policy, homeland security, international politics or conflict resolution experience/expertise whatsoever - are unbearably uninteresting and trite individuals. Why would I ever feel any sense of reassurance or take any kind of advice from a panel of these self-obsessed, wealthy, entitled celebrities? Other than M N Singh (Former police commissioner of Mumbai), none of the other panelists had any real reason to be on that show (except Ratna Pathak who just seems like a fiercely intelligent and lovely woman)! Yes, they are citizens and prominent members of the Mumbai crowd - but who cares! At a time when we need to be asking tough questions about the politics and policies of our country, who are these people?! Where were the relief workers, the members of the ATS or the police force, the activists, the academics, the Post-Trauma health workers, the journalists, the report writers, the think tank workers, on the panel? These are the people amongst us who are formulating and putting together ideas that will bring on-the-ground change to the country. These are the people who we should be engaging with and the nuance in their ideas are the ones we should be attempting to understanding. Not Simi Grewal and her narrow-minded, war-mongering politics.
And then, it hit me. Terrorism had struck. No, not for the first time nor the hardest (read as: highest death toll). But it had struck the richest. Terrorism was no more just dinner conversation about distant events in some sprawled out market in Delhi that one's Manolo Blahniks would never walk into nor was it about dead conductors on (god forbid they ever have to breathe the air in one) commuter trains in Mumbai. Terrorists, by upsetting the peace of South Bombay, have implanted that universal fear in the minds of the rich and famous in Mumbai - it could have been us.
And, suddenly, people like Ness Wadia and Mr. Oberoi are speaking using the most trite methods of verbal manipulation - populism. With stilted accents and hoity-toity tones, these multi-millionaires speak of big concepts and 'relate', in the most annoyingly fake way, to every citizen of India. But, that's the scary similarity between politicians and this crust of Mumbai society - their empty, thoughtless words and their complete lack of commitment to the communities of which they are a part. Cynic that I am, I can't help but feel that the sudden epiphany that the Indian govt. is not doing justice to its people does not come from a deep-set sense of disgust at the atrocities of political negligence - but more from a sense of elitist "we pay you guys and keep you guys in power and THIS is how you repay us?" Once a few more MP's are sacked, the Oberoi's and Taj's and their socialite friends are going to be able to find the millions to rebuild their grand hotels and ensure tighter security for their flashy public appearances and private jets. It's the rest of us that need to look deeper to rebuild our societies and find ways to create long-lasting social change.
***
Since Saturday, people have been falling over themselves to be heard over the din of angry voices. Every individual is trying to air his deep-set disappointment with the government using harsher and more eloquent words than his neighbour. From Amitabh's blog post about the ominous taking-justice-into-my-own-hands act of sleeping with a gun under his pillow to regular off-the-www-street bloggers who say "line up every politician in sight and shoot him" - India's favourite game, i.e. find a scapegoat in the government and then put as much pressure on him as possible, is being played with an unabashed sense of entitlement by every 'proud' citizen of our nation.
Please don't get me wrong - I am up there amongst the most disgusted critics of the Z-class security having, Merc driving, Bollywood gawking, Communal tension promoting, bribe swallowing, empty promises making senile idiots that are in positions of power in our country. However, what I am also a heavy-handed critic of is distancing ourselves from the process of that ultimately entrusts these leaders with our tax money - our role in choosing these men and women.
There are a million reasons to be livid with the current set of duffers in power. Why does it take 10hours to get forces to the Taj, in a city that has been plagued by terrorism and communal tension non-stop for the past 25-30 years? Thank you, Home Minister-saab for informing the whole world on TV that NSG men are leaving to take on the terrorists. Why oh why, however, did you think it necessary to give us all the classified details - number of NSG men, what time they would leave and what time they would start the operations? Thank you, Mr. Minister, the terrorists were ALSO watching you on TV. Why did the hundreds of fire fighters, who were putting their lives at risk trying to douse the flames at the Taj and evacuate hostages at the same time, enter a terrorist attack with 2 bullet-proof jackets and no bomb-detectors/detonators? Why didn't the authorities secure our harbours when they received the letter from the union of fishermen warning them of hijacked jetties, foreign smugglers and potential security threats? And these are only a handful of failures that have been brought to the fore thanks (I apologize for the seemingly insensitive use of this word) to the events of the past 4 days.
But please, let's not just jump on the shiny-and-sinfully-tempting bandwagon that is bashing our incompetent politicians and their apathy. Let's also take a good hard look at ourselves and our own personal role in the state of this democracy. How many of us take the time and make the effort to vote?! How many of us really know about candidates within our cities and states, research and engage with their political platforms? How much do we know about our constitution and our rights as citizens of a democracy? How many of us have ever considered working for the public sector or look to actively be a part of policy making/government institutions? We cannot sit around and hope for a change in leadership and better days - a community and a nation has to be worthy of it. We cannot expect a more secure nation when we roll our eyes at security personnel at airports and sigh deeply when our bags are checked at the cinema halls. How can we expect to elect leaders who represent our social opinions and world view if all our conversations on Indian politics are prefaced by the disclaimer "I hate politicians. I have no faith in the politics of our country." We ask ourselves, why aren't our politicians afraid of the people?! Because we, the people, are making a conscious decision - every day of our lives - to depoliticize and, ultimately, disempower ourselves.
***
But, like the politicians who delude us time and time again, I have said more than is necessary.
***
The past few days have changed me as a person. I wasn't in Bombay and I did not see the blood-lined streets or the gashes in the fabric of the city. And while I know you might find it trivial and pointless, I will light a candle to mourn the dead and hope for peace. But, that is NOT enough. Please, let us finally take responsibility for ourselves and our actions - let us rise to be the good citizens that our great country deserves. If not now, then when?
"Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. "
- Rabindranath Tagore
