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Friday, May 05, 2006
Subcontinental drift
Brahma Chellaney writes in the Wall Street Journal:
Tell me what you'd do about terrorism. (And avoid the general bromides.) Tell me what you'll do about poverty. (And avoid talking on the intent of policies, because that hasn't got us anywhere in 57 years.) Tell me what you'll do to get drinking water and electricity in every village in this country, to crush the Maoist rebellions brewing across the country, to enforce law and order, to clear up judicial backlog, to enable every Indian to rise up in life. Don't tell me what will be popular, tell me what is right, on the basis of what has worked in the past and what hasn't. Can you do that?
But we get none of that. Instead, we drift.
India's stoic, forbearing approach is now embedded in the national psyche. It is as if the Indian republic has come to accept terrorist strikes as the products of its unalterable geography or destiny. That may help explain why India's laconic response to the Pakistan-based jihadist groups' strategy to inflict death by a thousand cuts has been survival by a thousand bandages. Just as India has come to accept a high level of political corruption, it is starting to live with a high incidence of terrorism. Turning this abysmal situation around demands a new mindset that will not allow India to be continually gored.Indeed, what frustrates me about our aged leaders is that they do not communicate any all-encompassing vision for the country to us, thereby raising the entirely reasonable suspicion that they have none. I'd like to see a political party come out with a manifesto that lists the problems this country faces and the solutions it will implement if in power.
Tell me what you'd do about terrorism. (And avoid the general bromides.) Tell me what you'll do about poverty. (And avoid talking on the intent of policies, because that hasn't got us anywhere in 57 years.) Tell me what you'll do to get drinking water and electricity in every village in this country, to crush the Maoist rebellions brewing across the country, to enforce law and order, to clear up judicial backlog, to enable every Indian to rise up in life. Don't tell me what will be popular, tell me what is right, on the basis of what has worked in the past and what hasn't. Can you do that?
But we get none of that. Instead, we drift.
