Manmohan Creates History
Tuesday, 24. April 2007 - 2:32 PM
How often do you hear a nation’s Prime Minister blame the nation itself for inviting terrorism? That’s the conclusion you reach after you read what the Puppet Minister said:
Maintaining that security forces were playing an important role in Jammu and Kashmir, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday linked their deployment pattern to the extent of terrorism.
I read this news item several times thinking I was mistaken. This kind of stuff is the trademark of the Verbal Terrorist, not the Prime Minister of India. Anyway, what this amounts to if you chop the verbiage is: India should be blamed for terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir.
But why beat around the bush? Just “liberate” J&K and end terrorism in one shot.
24. April 2007 - 3:32 PM
Sandeep,
You can view the statement the other way as well. Security forces are there as a response to terrorism. So if people who want the focres to back off can bring down terrorism , the forces will have no need to be there. So deployment pattern of forces is based on terrorism on the ground
24. April 2007 - 3:43 PM
Ramesh,
I’m not sure I understood you correctly. But I agree the deployment pattern is linked to “terrorism on the ground.” However, with regard to J&K terrorism, the correct question to ask is who is behind this? The obvious answer is Pakistan. And it isn’t merely terrorism but a proxy war which will end with a strong response from India. That won’t happen too soon. That’s the reason for my lament: instead of taking a firm decision, MM Singh and others have a myopic view of the issue, resulting in stupid statements like this.
24. April 2007 - 7:04 PM
Sandeep,
While I yield to none in my contempt for what Manmohan Singh has become, I think I’d give him the benefit of doubt on this one. I agree with Ramesh. The statement is poorly worded, but intends to convey the meaning that the deployment of the INA is linked to the pattern of terrorism on the ground. That is consistent with our nation’s position on withdrawing the armed forces once the need for their action is over.
-Sri
24. April 2007 - 7:12 PM
Sri,
Perhaps, but Manmohan Singh should shut up instead of issuing statements like this. He’s the goddamn PM of a country and loose talk doesn’t go down well.
But the fundamental issue is the failure of all Governments to tackle the problem’s roots.
24. April 2007 - 7:59 PM
It is unfortunate that you are criticizing someone on the basis of a paraphrased quote. Here are the exact words:
[source]
I don’t think that this can be interpreted to mean “India should be blamed for terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir”.
You may, of course, take issue with these words too. But I hope you would edit your post appropriately.
On a side note: I think this is my first visit to the blog. Keep up the good work!
24. April 2007 - 10:19 PM
Vivek,
Thanks. Let’s see what the actual words–as opposed to the paraphrased ones–mean:
>>…every possible action would be taken to see that the deployment of security forces is directly related to the scale of the problems on the ground which they are required to tackle.
I agree with it. However, who or where is the scale of problems defined? And then there’s the question of actual terrorist incidents occurring. Recent news shows that terrorism has actually escalated in scale. Doesn’t it make more sense to deploy more troops?
25. April 2007 - 7:28 AM
That is indeed the question to ask.
There is a rather dated article by B.Raman that provides data upto 1998.
http://www.saag.org/papers2/paper192.htm
And then there is the data (2004-06) from a reply submitted to Rajya Sabha.
http://164.100.24.219/rsq/quest.asp?qref=122364
The 2 set of figures seem to indicate that they are from the same agency.
I would rather not go by what media choses to report (it certainly did not report on all 1667 incidents in 2006 or 6043 incidents in 1994). Figures from B.Raman and his sources are more reliable.
As an aside, even if troop levels are increased, would you expect this to be announced?