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Tuesday, July 05, 2005
Ayodhya
I was out all day (not inspecting hooch, sadly), and thus did not blog about the terrorist attacks on Ayodhya when they were reported. You surely know the news by now: six terrorists killed in the attack, the Lashkar-e-Taiba suspected to be behind it, a security alert sounded around the country, the usual words from the prime minister about crushing terror, and a story about how the government had intelligence reports about the attack. There is also some needless hyperbole from the BJP about how the incident was an attack "on the Hindu faith itself".
Such rhetoric is needless. The attack was, first and foremost, a crime against the Indian state, which is reason enough to treat it with the utmost seriousness. Religion should not come into it. As Nitin Pai says in a characteristically lucid and pithy analysis:
Such rhetoric is needless. The attack was, first and foremost, a crime against the Indian state, which is reason enough to treat it with the utmost seriousness. Religion should not come into it. As Nitin Pai says in a characteristically lucid and pithy analysis:
Coming during a time when the BJP is attempting to reinvent itself, the attack is a brazen attempt to keep alive the communal divide that is the bane of India’s politics. If it is L K Advani’s desire to re-position the BJP as a mainstream centre-right political party, he would do well to avoid fanning the flames. His call for nationwide public protests is not only dangerous in its own right, it will play right into the hands of the terrorists. [Links in the original.]Bang on. As Primary Red of Secular-Right India writes, "India needs to show maturity commensurate with its claims as a great power."
