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People must remain vigilant In his front-page editorial,
“The peace process has ended” (July 14), H.K. Dua has unequivocally exposed the Machiavellian machinations and double-speak of President Musharraf and his cohorts calling their “obsessional concern with Kashmir” as being the root cause of all “acts of terrorism” against us. Unless checked, these barbarous acts could seriously threaten our
national security. While condemnation of terrorism by President Bush and others are welcome, we have to ensure our own national security. It’s time for us to have a fresh and dispassionate look at our security concerns unitedly — transcending political differences and communal divides. The loopholes in our vigilance and security arrangements — at the Centre and in the states — need to be identified and immediate action taken to plug them expeditiously. Terrorists invariably bank on local support for their logistic requirements. It’s here that an alert populace, with the help of security forces, can defeat their nefarious intentions. Hence, we must train our people to remain vigilant at all times.
Brig GOVIND SINGH KHIMTA (retd), Shimla
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II No world leader can deny Pakistan’s hand in the Mumbai blasts. Our leaders should not trust General Musharraf’s assurance on terrorism. Pakistan has been abetting terrorist elements against India to grab the Kashmir valley. Experience suggests that every President and Prime Minister of Pakistan sings the song of Kashmir to retain their chairs. Their main object is to create trouble for India, keeping an eye on the Kashmir valley. Terrorism must be tackled firmly to maintain internal peace. The other issue relating to caste and reservation should be put aside, as suggested by Mr Dua. R.S. HAMDARD, Hamirpur III The Centre must realise that resilience is no substitute of action. Criminals on both sides of the border who are responsible for these heinous crimes against innocent people are confident that Indians, after creating some noise for sometime, will forget this tragedy and again will be ready to start the peace process. India should take commando action in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir to destroy the jehadi camps. If Pakistan does not bother about all-out war while taking action against India, why should India desist from taking some bold action? We are losing our men and women daily in Kashmir while Pakistani army is not suffering at all. Owing to inaction, we have allowed Pakistan to put us in this unfortunate position. V.P. MEHTA, Chandigarh IV Pakistan lacks the military might to “liberate” Kashmir by conventional military force. However, it believes that it can employ low intensity warfare to force India to grant self-determination to the Valley. If India can concentrate on the internal sources of Kashmiri conflict and creatively and courageously introduce new political and economic measures to mitigate the grievances of Kashmiris, these can satisfy the Valley’s people as also weaken Pakistan’s low intensity warfare campaign. Since the disputes within Kashmir and between India and Pakistan are related, conflict resolution inside Kashmir will help resolve the Indo-Pak disputes and move forward towards a more peaceful relationship. AMAN RAI, Chandigarh V The serial bomb blasts in Mumbai and Srinagar are shameful and cowardly acts of terrorists. In Srinagar, some passersby nabbed a militant who lobbed a grenade and was handed over to the police. This is a very brave and responsible act and should be appreciated. If all of us become so aware and responsible, these misdeeds will stop automatically. Dr JASMER SINGH, Karnal VI The Indian government should tell Pakistan once and for all that Kashmir is an integral part of India and that it is not negotiable. We must heed Mr Dua’s advice: “The responsibility of guarding India is of our government at the Centre and the states. They need to get their act together and work out a detailed strategy to combat terrorism which is a serious threat to national security.” Lt-Col ONKAR CHOPRA
(retd), New Delhi
No war-mongers With the authority you have said the peace process has ended, so it must have. If this is so, have the Ayatollahs in Delhi taken us Sikhs — who live on India’s border with two nuclear states, with weapons of genocide — been taken into confidence, as we have the maximum to lose if peace is over? In 1947, the Hindu and Muslim leadership made the Labour Prime Minister Attlee believe that peace between the two communities would prevail if India is split into two communal states. Attlee was a fool to have believed this. Now isn’t it the responsibility of the inheritors of Nehru, Gandhi and Jinnah’s wisdom to make this theory work? In 1947, partitioning India, without taking us into confidence made us Sikhs the victims of the biggest ethnic cleansing known to history. Do we Sikhs matter in the thought process of India’s policy makers? We all know that we Sikhs have half our historic religious places of worship in Pakistan and Lahore has always inspired our political aspirations. If the peace process is over as you say it is, then it is the incompatibility of Hindu-Muslim politics and cohabitation. Why take a unilateral decision on this most sensitive issue without taking the third party, the Sikhs’ sensitivities and aspirations into consideration? Switzerland like South Asia has three major nationalities which compose this great land, Italians, French and German. All three in the past have torn Europe into war, turmoil and pain in every century of the past. But in Switzerland they have shown political sagacity, co-existence and cohabitation and remained one and united, though their co-nationalities in Europe have been at one another’s throats. The Muslims and Hindus had their say in 1947. Will they both let us Sikhs have our say now — “We want peace, carry on with the peace process you two”. We want no war-mongers in South Asia. Away with your weapons of mass destruction, missiles and launching vehicles for nuclear weapons in space. SIMRANJIT SINGH MANN, President, Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar), Quilla S. Harnam Singh, (Fatehgarh Sahib) |
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