Monday, August 27, 2007

My city bleeds.....

Two acts of terrorism tore through my city this weekend, ending lives and dreams and shaking people out of their safe cocoon. Places where people went to in this busy metro to chill, relax and make some good memories have turned into legacies of a tragedy that Hyderabad wont forget soon. Terrorism knows no religion, and whoever orchestrated this has sinned so much that no god will ever forgive them. And we share the loss with strangers and friends alike, and also with people who came to see our city's rich culture instead will go back with the memory of blood and death.

Sadly, it is just 48 hours past the incident, and we are already growing indifferent and it has become old news. The law still has no idea and no one probably be punished till 13 years have passed, like in the case of the Bombay blasts. And we will think before we go into a movie theatre or even a popular food joint anymore. Because it doesn't matter anymore what color, caste or creed you are, whether you have money or not. No place is safe anymore. More then lives was lost, we lost the feeling of being safe, of being protected.

But as all cities in India, we will shake off the blast dust and wash away the blood and keep the show running. Life doesn't stop for terrorism after all. But shouldn't our bravery be awarded by some responsibility by our so -called leaders. Is it too much to ask our leaders to protect us or do we have to learn to live with death and fear?

6 comments:

neerubhai said...

We had prior information about such kind of activity. Still our politicians were so busy fighting vote bank issue with dharnas and agitations and our police were busy protecting them, they just didnt have much time to plan and act on that intelligence. Result! the death of scores of innocent people. Doesnt matter. After all their aim is lakhs of voters. -40 is not something to worry about.

Unknown said...

As a Hyderabadi, I feel so helpless today. I was so proud of being a part of this liberal and extremely safe city. Today, it doesnt matter if I am in the police force or a politician. My hands are tied. How can a citizen get the system in order. Can he or she implement public security measures. Who can check with the strangers carrying dicey looking bags around. How can people stop being careless in public places. The attitude of Hyderabadis needs to change. They have to become more cautious and pragmatic. Law and Order should not be practised only by the ones we elect, but we as literate and responsible citizens of the society should ourselves pave the path to freedom and peace by practising it as amateurs. And finally, I pray God take good care of the deprived souls who were affected by this ghastly incident.

Srobona RC said...

I too wonder what we can do about it ourselves. We are privy to any intelligence or have any training in spotting trouble. So what can we do? Perhaps we can more co-opertaive with cinema halls that are installing security checks. If you see unclaimed baggaes lying around, its better to raise an alarm and just dismiss it. I think we should also start report lack of security or slip ups in security when and where we notice it. May not be much, but we can protect our own.

illusions said...

Today it screamed out loud in TOI that the number of lives lost to terrorism in India is only second to Iraq. And people Iraq are at war! The number of people dead in acts of terror are are more than the combined numbers of US, UK, Central America put together in the last three years. So that is the reality. Sadly, our so called leaders/politicians are completely unperturbed by the situation and very happy in their petty fights. To them the average citizen is just a number on teh electoral rolls and in a nation which boasts of 16% of the world's population a few gone does not disturb them at all. After all it is psiephology (pls excuse if I did not get the spelling right, the science of election is what I meant),which matters to them. All us Indians are highly dispensable number to them.

In our resilience and struggle to make a decent middle class living we try to forget and move forward with the existential daily chores. Two years back the day before Diwali all of us were out on the streets celebrating with our friends and suddenly a roll of thunder rocked us and in five minutes time we realised a bomb had just hit 5km away at Sarojini Nagar Market in New Delhi. And this is the capital of the country with highest security measures applicable. But till date neither intelligence nor police have been able to foil a single act of terror in Delhi.

Our vision less politicians are busy flexing muscles over the Nuclear deal and to bring down the government hopefully without realizing they are helping the destabilizing elements, incase they still continue this foolhardiness with the knowledge of they are only strengthening the power of these elements.

The police can only show brutal force on the innocent in this country examples being Nandigram and Khammam recently and have never been active in safeguarding or protecting its people. The intelligence does not work which has been proved by the breach of the Parliament of this nation. Why are we even saying we felt safe? If you are in India and in late 20s or early 30s by now we should realize the chances of dying in a terror act is more probable than an accident.

This is the real "Mera Bharat Mahan!"

Unknown said...

It is really shocking to see the visuals of those who are deceased in the brutal incident. I never thought that terrorists would target innocent people like these.In recent acts of terrorism, aimed at provoking communal tension, appear to have been supported by a global supply chain. Attacks planned in one part of the world, arms procured from another, acted out in yet another, and probably celebrated by terrorists across. While one organisation claims responsibility, it's often a part of bigger network. I, seriously feel that this kind of terrorism should be stopped.

There are certain aspects about the blasts that seem to be ignored in the media. Some of them are given below:

First time children have been targeted (Lumbini Park is essentially a Children's Park). It has always been religious places or localities with large people of particular communities that have been targeted. Presuming that terrorists are actually behind the blast what brings about this change in strategy?


Gokul is a very busy place. Gokul Chat Bhandar is a place always crowded with people. You would not find an inch of space to stand in the place. How could someone plant a bomb without anyone noticing? It should not be difficult to find out from the people about any suspicious objects placed at Gokul.

How was a ‘terror-hand’ unearthed within an hour of the blast? What is the info that prompted the police to ‘declare’ terrorist intent behind the blast?

Explosives found at 16 other places. What the heck are the police and indeed the political establishment doing? Intelligence agencies have warned time and again that Hyderabad had become a beehive for a lot of terrorist sleeper cells. Yet, no action or efforts were visible at the ground level of any efforts made to unearth the sleeper cells.

Why does no one ever get caught for such blasts?

Why do such acts always happen in Congress regimes? This is no outlandish claim but perfectly verifiable fact (You could browse the net for a chronology of the incidents). Hyderabad was prone to communal riots and terror attacks before NTR became the chief Minister. While NTR was the CM hardly any incidents of this nature happened. However, once NTR lost power and the Congress came back, the incidents of communal and terror disturbances resumed again. They stopped when the TDP party of NTR came back to power. Hyderabad saw a long period of peace for 9 years under the TDP regime (Chandrababu Naidu replaced NTR as the Chief Minister after a year). Unfortunately, the TDP lost power again and guess what? The communal disturbances and Bomb blasts have resumed again. Who is in power? The Congress Party.

This comes as no surprise to the Hyderabadis for most of them know where the priorities of the Congress lie. The people here have a special phrase to describe the Congress regime – “Mana Rajyam” or ‘our government.’ The ‘our’ in this phrase, however is not the common man but the powerful businessman, leader, politician or a powerful goonda or a terrorist. These sections have great freedom to do what they want that is why they call it their government (‘Our Government’).

Let us pray for all those who lost their lives in the blast and also for those who engineered the blasts.

Hemant Kumar said...

Meeaaaooowww!!: I am not, first time I show your blog.