Raging tempers…

So I broke off (platonic equivalent of break-up… is there a better phrase that is as compact and more established? Okay, parted ways) with old friend, Pankaj, today. This once, it was him who did the honours (block on Gtalk, delete from Facebook) and not me (and I wouldn’t succumb to those actions in this matter, which I consider trivial), and I would like to have that on record.

Anyway, it started with an argument. He read this article very fleetingly, and made an elaborate and (I feel) ill-informed opinion on it. I objected in strong words. We argued. It ended badly.

He says Kasab should’ve been shot as soon as the investigators derived from him that he had no information to offer.
[He also feels that Kasab may as well have been accommodated at the Taj, since his cost of daily up-keep would’ve probably come to the same amount of Rs. 85-lakh per day. {The figure in the news article reads Rs. 8.5 lakhs per day. As I said, he read the article in one fleeting glance. Thank you for pointing it out, Tauja!}] But I’m not saying that Rs. 8.5 lakhs is an acceptable amount either.
But that he maintains that Kasab should’ve been shot as soon as they figured out he had no more valuable information to offer, ergo without trial is worth discussing.

When celebrities or politicians are accused of any crime, and receive special treatment in their trials etc. etc. the common man is up in arms saying that they should be treated like anyone else.
So is it fair for us to deny Kasab a trial? Would that not be equivalent to denying him the rights accorded to the common man? Or should nobody be accorded a free and fair trial?
Is it healthy for us to nurture such glaring hypocrisies in our attitude? Or should we just go ahead and rewrite the constitution to accord different rights to different types of people? Or just go about making exceptions everywhere and then fighting over which exception is fair and which is not?

Are most/all of the democratic countries of the world (Please correct me if I’m wrong on this, peeps…) stupid in allowing the accused, any accused, of any crime a trial before convicting him of charges? (And the right to appeal the sentence in higher courts.) Would we be okay if tomorrow YOU weren’t allowed to appeal in a higher court? Sure, Manu Sharma would have been acquitted.
Or maybe we could just make an exception here and an exception there, and then argue over it forever?

I welcome your comments on the questions phrased above. What I do NOT welcome are comments about how the judicial system needs to be improved. Yes, the judicial system needs to be improved. The trial should’ve been completed in a matter of months and not 18. We all know that, and I’m sure we’d all agree on it too. So let’s discuss the issue that I wrote this entire post to discuss. We can discuss Judicial reforms on a later date, capisce?

Oh, and one more thing. Rs. 1,500 crore for a cricket team in a month-long intra-national cricket event. Rs. 31 crore over protecting the escape of the most dreaded criminal this country has ever set hands on, over a period of one and a half years. Am I the ONLY one who thinks the 31-crores is REALLY inconsequential here?

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Turn a blind eye

For how long will we keep running around hunting out Bombs planted in random parts of massive cities? For how long will we keep vowing to hunt down those who cause unrest, to no avail? For how long will we keep claiming that “We won’t bow down to anti-social forces” in the wake of more and more attacks?

Who planted these bombs? We know. Why did they plant it? For some sort of twisted pleasure? No. A personal agenda? Do they earn money? No. Do they lose their livelihood and lives? Yes.
Why do they commit themselves to such a destiny? Would they not rather live safe and sound as we do, shop in markets, walk in parks as any other citizen would in every right?

Yesterday was no ordinary terrorist attack. They did not strike with a motive of mass killings, for low intensity bombs don’t quite do that; but they had a motive – they wanted to send out a message.
They are trying to speak out, in whatever crooked way. What they do is wrong; it is not fair to us. But they have no lawful forum to reach out to the government. The government does not give them one. The government does not recognise their voice, and rightfully so. But in the present context, the government MUST recognise their motives; for only upon addressing it do we have hope of ending such motivated acts.

Yesterday, it was allegedly for Gujarat. But why strike in Delhi when everything that went wrong was so far away from it?
I believe it was Kashmir. Kashmir, the root of all problems. Kashmir, a place which if it had not existed, there would’ve been so much more peace.
Who is to blame? We do not acknowledge that half the state is not in our control and will never be ours. For the remaining half, we’re too afraid to ask the inhabitants how THEY would want to live their lives.
Plebiscite, Plebiscite. Let there be plebiscite. Who governs Kashmir does not matter to a Delhi-ite or a Bombay-ite. It does not matter to the average Pakistani nor to the Bangalorean.
It matters only and only to the average Kashmiri. Then why don’t we ask them what they want? Why are we so afraid of the truth? Why are we so reluctant to let go of those who do not want to belong to us? Why are we so insistent on imposing ourselves?

In spite of all the terrorist attacks, I wonder. Why the terrorism? Is there something they’re trying to voice? Why are we not listening? Because we don’t want to listen to terrorists. But does that mean that the terrorists do not have a point? Will it really take 60 years and more? Why did the British ever leave India? Are we really worthy of ruling ourselves?
What the terrorists do is wrong. Our ignorance is wrong.

You can’t clap with one hand.

Plebiscite, Plebiscite. Let there be plebiscite.