ExpertDabbler

There are actually two faces to acts of terror. One which gets enacted in American and UK soils and the version which gets executed in places like Kashmir.
Readers may be wondering “what the heck, its precious human lives after all, right?”. Blame it on their naivette. Its never that simple to an average westerner or western media.

Remember friends, there is one fundamental philosophy which goes like this, “All people are equal but some are more equal than others”.

Western media finds acts like 9/11 as “an attack on our freedom of thought, our democracy, and our culture”. But it is never so clear when it happens in Kashmir. Or when an Indian flight gets hijacked to Kandhahar.

Western media, with due respect to their professionalism, will not have second thoughts in calling Kashmir as “Indian occupied Kashmir” and even say that all the atrocities that had happened were because of “excesses” by our security forces. Terrorists in Kashmir are “freedom fighters”, mind you. Not very different from Musharraf’s version.

How many times have we seen high level diplomats from that bloody America express their concern about “Human rights violation” in Kashmir? Have any of these US diplomats or any other developed nation or media has ever talked about the plight of Kashmiri Pandit community? Apparently, they are the least equals of the lot. Right at the bottom of preference for justice and fairness.

But their tone always seems to be “Now don’t talk about Abu Ghraib ok? Prisoners are getting treated in the “bestest, fairest” possible way. All the pictures you see are fakes. Just like our President’s photographs with turkey during Thanksgiving Day”

And we, the third worlders should rest in the belief that only 9/11 and now London are “the most barbaric acts in the history of mankind”.

Can anyone remind them that far too many 9/11s occured in Kashmir, Punjab and Srilanka for far too long for us to care and count?

Why is that any dastardly act is given a color of freedom struggle if it happens in Kashmir and terrorism if it happens in US and Uk?

Thee are reasons friends. Violence in Kashmir, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan or Sri Lanka leads to a surge in demand for weapons. Which means weapons manufacturers in the western world can laugh all the way to their banks. But what about innocents moved out of their homes and left starving? “No problem, we can throw them food packets from air crafts with our flag in the cover and its a fantatsic view to see starving people fighting for those packets at ground level like street dogs you know?” seems to be the response by US and UK governments in deed, if not in words.

To my mind, UK citizens are now paying the price for being an accomplice to that ultimate symbol of universal peace, love and brotherhood - US government and its foreign policy.

Note:

Amidst all this western bashing, let us take this opportunity to appreciate the efforts taken by Scandinavian countries, particularly Norway in trying to bring peace to Sri Lanka.

It should also be remembered that there exists one continent which goes by the name of Africa and it hardly ever gets covered in any media, for obvious reasons.

The London blasts made me reminisce the events that unfolded on Feb. 14 1998 in Coimbatore city. Valentines day was not exactly romantic in Coimbatore that year. Coimbatore was featured in BBC for all the wrong reasons.

I was at home that time. i casually stepped out to my friend’s house in RS Puram. It was about 3 in the afternoon. I had travelled about a kilometer and i could sense something was amiss. Phew. No Bus transport!. Sathy road looked deserted and i chose to ask one passerby if anything was wrong.

“Seriyaa pochu ponga. Advani kalandhukka irundha meetingla bomb vachutangalam. Nalla velai avar varalai. thappichuttaar.Innum neraya idhathile bomb vedichurukku. Hospital, Gandhipuram Bus Stand ella idamum bomb.Endha bus um odalai”

That was a shocker. I returned home. Exchanged information with my friends over phone and slowly the magnitude of terror had begun to sink in. At least a few hundreds have been killed. Scores injured. The bombs had been planted even in GH. Obviously they had targetted Advani.
And I could not imagine what catastrophe it would have been if Advani had been in the scene.

One bomb had gone off in Sir Shanmugham Road. Hardly a few hundred yards from my friends place.
The main one, in TV Swamy Road - DB Road Junction had killed about 10.About 13 bombs exploded in various parts of the city. My friend and his father who were about to go near that dreaded meeting venue for some other purpose delayed for about 10 minutes and that probably saved their lives.

The next day, we had a torture of a different kind. A car with full of explosives was found parked in Lokhmanya Street in RS Puram near one huge Apartment complex. The mechanism was such that it would explode if someone tried to open the door. That was one marvellous piece of thinking albeit a bit cold blooded. The entire area was cordoned off. It was said if that bomb had gone off, nothing would remain for a radius of 0.5 kilometers. RS puram was and is still one of the most posh localities of Coimbatore. Each and every family in the vicinity was told to vacate their place and go to Mettupalayam Road or further whenever the bomb expertise chose to inspect the car.

If my memory serves me right, it took about 4 days for some bomb experts to come from NDA, Pune or some other place to understand the logic and diffuse the bombs in the car.

What a relief it was!

I have since then used that Lokhmanya street so many times but invariably thoughts of that car bomb strike me whenever i see that apartment. It sure was destined to stay there.

I am sure dubukku or whoever who goes to Liverpool station or any of the affected station hereafter will have a shiver in their spine.

As if that Black eyed whatever was not enough, i checked out www.itwofs.com and it was bloody fun.

Makkale, endha music director um vidhi vilakkilai:)

I was genuinely shocked to find IR’s Kanavu kaanum to be nothing but a tamil version of Kalyaanji Anandji’s hindi piece:)

Latest big time stealer to my mind is Yuvan. Kadhal kondaen la padhikku mela ctrl+c and ctrl+v dhaan:)

Ennamo ellam nalla irundha seri.

Folks,

Please visit Ganesh’s blog and lend a ear to these remix of these black eyed whatever. A straight lift from Maestro’s 8-’s “Mukkal Munagal” song. Lift nu kooda solla maaten. Just like that use pannirukaanga, song mulukka.
And I thought Deva, Bappi Lahiri are the best.Phew.
(i know most of my regulars know abt this, this is for some others who don’t know as yet)