A, brief Google search, came up with these, which on the face of it, suggest that Hindu terrorism is not quite the ‘myth’ you make it out to be:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7739541.stm

or this:

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/opinion/editorial/general/we-all-must-face-this-together/1375912.aspx?storypage=0

It is very difficult for someone like me, who is not ‘up to speed’ as it were to know whether you are right or wrong. But the Gujarat atrocity in particular seems to suggest that it is not quite as one sided as you make it out to be. I am led to believe that the catalyst for this – the train disaster – was, in fact, hyped up:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_7086/is_/ai_n28130700

which, if true, is a disgrace.

Today the State and Union Governments stand exposed. It is important to recognise the long-term damage that their dirty-tricks have caused. A new term — ‘Hindu terror’ — has been added to the security lexicon. The world so far recognised only ‘Islamic terror’, with Pakistan as its source. Now India is home to both Islamic and Hindu terror, if the Indian Government’s own agencies are to be believed. On the issue of terror, India and Pakistan have been placed at par.

All this must rank as the most destructive achievement by any Government anywhere. What Pakistan could not achieve after decades of labour — paint Hindu-dominated India as a factory of terror — the ‘secularists’ and their political leaders have done it in a matter of few weeks. Till recently, after every terrorist strike in India, the investigations invariably led to Pakistan and the infamous ISI. Gradually the rest of the world had come to believe the Indian charge that Islamic Pakistan was exporting terrorism to non-sectarian India. The participation of local Muslims in ISI-sponsored attacks in India used to be nominal. However, thanks to the UPA’s vote-bank politics, since 2005, nationalist Muslims stand marginalised and radicals within the community are setting the agenda. The periodic terror strikes in India are no longer an exclusive ISI enterprise. They have largely been indigenised — of course, under the supervision of a global terror machine.

Unwilling to face up to this, the ‘secularists’ sought to maintain a bogus balance. They ignored the fact that all participants in such terror strikes were Muslims, claiming inspiration from the holy Quran and arguing that they were killing ‘infidels’ as part of their religious duty. The faith-based motivations of the terrorists led to the term Islamic terror.

To counter-balance Islamic terror secularists had to discover — or invent — ‘Hindu terror’. The expected political gains were a welcome byproduct. While Muslim terrorists were responsible for popularising the term Islamic terror, the credit for coining the term ‘Hindu terror’ goes to the UPA. For no one else has attributed terrorist actions to the service of Hinduism.

Let us review the brief history of ‘Hindu terror’. Mr Sharad Pawar, a senior member of the Union Cabinet, alleged on October 5, 2008, that there were “double standards” in police action against terror: ‘Muslims were being targeted as terrorists but no action was being taken against ‘Hindu terror’ groups. Mr Pawar’s statement had come in the wake of the Malegaon bombing of September 29. How did Mr Pawar know the identity of those responsible for Malegaon terror strike even before the investigations had concluded is something that remains a mystery.

Obviously the investigations now followed the lead given by the Central Minister. The job of the ATS was easy. All it had to do was cook up ‘evidence’ on the lines indicated by the powers that be. The ‘evidence’ may not have been sufficient to stand court scrutiny but selective leaks to the media, on a daily basis, were enough to generate confusion and create the myth of ‘Hindu terror’. It was vindication for those who fervently desired the discovery of such a phenomenon for their own vested interests.

Mr Pawar was not being original in floating this devious theory. Prior to the 2007 Gujarat Assembly elections, Ms Sonia Gandhi had used the description “maut ka saudagar” for Mr Narendra Modi. Mr Digvijay Singh, the Congress general secretary, has frequently harped on the theme of ‘Hindu terror’.

In order to sustain the plot to demonise Hindus, the Maharashtra ATS improvised several sub-plots. In the process, the Indian Army was traduced as a rogue force, one in which a middle-level officer could pilfer 60 kg of RDX. Worse, it was made out as if the so-called ‘theft’ had remained undetected till the ‘ace investigators’ of the ATS had uncovered it. So the Army is not only infested with ‘terrorists’ but also totally unprofessional in its management of arms and ammunition. Could there be a worse indictment of the armed forces?

After the details of torture and inhuman treatment meted out to the so-called ‘Hindu terror’ suspects — that included a sadhvi and a serving Army officer — became public, there was mass outrage. The ATS was now forced to manufacture a new spin. Without an iota of evidence, it alleged that the accused were conspiring to kill top leaders of the RSS, since they found the Sangh “pro-Muslim” and non-violent in its approach to ideological opponents.

With this, the ATS hoped to drive a wedge within the Hindu political family. But the reverse happened and the RSS saw through the ATS’s game plan. One unintended consequence of this has been that the RSS has got the ATS’s endorsement as a law-abiding organisation, committed to peaceful activism, contrary to what ‘secularists’ have been trying to establish for decades.

The onus of convincing a sceptical public of this fantastic and outlandish ‘conspiracy’ to assassinate RSS leaders rests on the Maharashtra ATS, now deprived of its inspirational leader. All that it has produced so far is the laptop of Lt Col Purohit. The computer hard disk apparently has files containing recordings of the conspiracy. This sounds not just illogical but downright bizarre. Would an Army officer with several years of Military Intelligence experience store details of a conspiracy of this nature?

Rather than chase trivia, the Maharashtra Government and the ATS would have been better served enhancing intelligence gathering. The colossal attack on Mumbai over the past two days has made it clear that jihad — and not any ‘Hindu terror’ pipedream of the ruling political establishment — represents a threat to India. Let us focus on this enemy, and avenge the martyrdom of Hemant Karkare and his valiant colleagues.

I’m very impressed with Jai’s last two posts. There is a seriously good brain at work there.

Thanks Douglas, very kind of you.

As for “George”, given the noticeable pattern of behaviour he’s recently been demonstrating on PP along with his defence of Al-Zawahri making racist comments about Obama being a “house negro” (see “Thanks Al-Qaeda” thread), I think it’s pretty clear that we have a bonafide AQ/terrorist jihadi sympathiser here.

The flashing cursor is almost telling me to say something more.

I actually detest the moral sterility of comparative atrocities. george at 62, is certainly a morally sterile comparative relativist. In my opinion, we cannot, if we wish to survive as a species, argue that past wrongs justify present atrocities. It is a road to nowhere.

That should have alerted Mr Tharoor to the accumulated anger waiting to explode in vengeful acts.
And it finally did. Was the retribution disproportionate?

Only an idiot would assume that the answer to an atrocity was another atrocity. Or even argue proportionality. I present ‘george’ for your delight and delectation.

But then you can’t actually be bothered to search can you?

Kulvinder, as I mentioned in a couple of other related threads, it looks like there are several racists and religious jingoists here on PP with an axe to grind against India, Indians and Hindus, waiting to come out the woodwork and seize the chance to stick the knife in and twist it like a bunch of opportunistic vultures. It’s pretty disgusting.

This presumes their demands are reasonable or achievable; whilst i woulddn’t rule out hearing what their rhetoric of the day is or what the reason is for them charging into hospitals to kill innocent – and wounded – people; the fact they say they’re open to negotiation is in itself meaningless. The original and ‘demand’ by Bin Laden was the withdrawl of US troops from Saudi Arabia, he didn’t end his desire to destroy the heathens and infidels in the west or east then and i doubt he’ll do so when the US troops leave Iraq.

Some people are just looking for a fight, some people just want to dominate others, and (to quote a line from “The Dark Knight”), some people just want to see the world burn. Take your pick regarding which of these apply to OBL, AQ and their supporters.

How do we deal with people like this, whose demands are frequently neither reasonable nor achievable ? The same way you deal with bullies in any walk of life:

1) Surgically dissect and debunk their demands and their credibility.

2) Ideally, don’t give them further ammunition in terms of any excessive or unjustifiable “transgressions” of your own.

3) Most of all, they need to be absolutely terrified of the damage you could potentially inflict on them if they triggered a counter-response in retaliation or self-defence. It’s not enough to have the hypothetical capability of “taking them down” — you need to be seen to have the will to actually execute it. Otherwise it just emboldens them further and the lack of a sufficiently strong, assertive reaction is perceived as a weakness.

Fear of forceful retaliation/punishment is, unfortunately, sometimes the only way to make psychopathic bullies back down or make them think twice about pulling any kind of stunt, especially if they’re well aware that they’re being complete bastards and/or aren’t open to reason or appeals to their presumed good nature.

Wonder where he got those percentages from.

Ashik made them up, based on his usual guesswork and misinformed assumptions.

And it finally did. Was the retribution disproportionate?

Considering the fact that numerous Muslims were also killed in the “retribution”, including fairly conservative and orthodox ordinary folk who you would certainly not describe as “westernised” or amongst the “urban elite”, I would describe the selection of targets as per your hypothetical agenda to be misguided to say the least.

That line of thinking reminds me of one of Omid Djalili’s observations during a live stand-up show, where he remarked about the stupidity of the 7/7 bombers targetting Edware Road, an area which (in his own tongue-in-cheek words) “has the biggest number of Muslims outside Mecca”.

Also, considering the fact that Islamic codes of warfare prohibit attacks against civilians, especially women and children, let’s not ignore the sheer hypocrisy of so-called “holy warriors” directly contravening these injunctions whilst claiming full divine support for their actions. Regardless of how justified they might believe the “retribution” to be. No ifs, no buts, and no caveats implying “extenuating circumstances”.

That should have alerted Mr Tharoor to the accumulated anger waiting to explode in vengeful acts.
And it finally did. Was the retribution disproportionate?

It seems as though you are trying to justify the killings in Mumbai. What’s happened in Gujarat and Kashmir are clearly deplorable but they still do not justify the carnage we’ve just witnessed recently.

Neither India nor Pakistan has a particularly good record in Kashmir. Pakistan has actively supported terrorism, of the kind we’ve recently witnessed, to wage a proxy war on India and rip Kashmir out of the map of India, while India has committed some grave human rights abuses in trying to contain the insurgency. You also have to remember that hundreds of thousands of Hindus have been cleansed from Kashmir as a result of attacks on them, yet you make no mention of that. Pakistan’s record in tackling insurgency in Balochistan is not much better than India’s in Kashmir. Personally, I don’t give a toss if Kashmir goes independent, but will it stop terrorist attacks on the Indian mainland? I don’t think it will.

Regarding the Gujarat pogrom, it is a shame that the people responsible for that still haven’t been brought to justice. There was a pogrom against Christians recently in Orissa. It didn’t feature too long on the news either. Is it any surprise there hasn’t been much in the way of justice? Such is the state of law and order in much of India and South Asia generally.

Coming from a minority community myself, I am against extremists of any kind trying to solve their disputes through violence and claiming to represent their community. That’s why I agree with Mr Tharoor here.

they reveal an interesting bias in what we consider to be terrorism and the sort of event that might warrant a response…

When will ongoing caste Hindu terrorism against low-caste and poor Indians attract 66+ posts on expatriate fora?

Oh please, at least TRY and make an argument, i could ask self-rightous rhetorical questions at the age of 10.

Presuming you’re talking about this site theres been articles on religious extremism with comparable numbers of replies regardless of whether the religion was sikhism, hinduism or islam.

But then you can’t actually be bothered to search can you?

When will ongoing caste Hindu terrorism against low-caste and poor Indians attract 66+ posts on expatriate fora? When we can address such untrammeled violence in the heart of Indian society, we might be able to claim even-handedness in our concern with organized violence and its effects, whatever its motivations.

Has this attack got something to do with American foreign policy?

Yeah with the help of the Rand Corporation, in conjunction with the saucer people under the supervision of the reverse vampires.

Conspiracy theories are spouted by plebs; you revel in them, don’t you?

You seem to say Gujerat and Iraq to be cause of what happened. The Gujerat purportrators need to be called to justice. I strongly support that. But I fail to understand why certain sections of the Islamic societies feel so victimised all the time.

If that logic were to be followed the RSS etc also rightfull in their demands. The Hindus in Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Kashmiri Pandits – all are oppressed. so we shoud play second fiddle to them as well. I dont agree with RSS either.

Brotherhood is a strong feature( a kind of religoius socialism) and attraction of Islam. But this very brother hood also means that every time one Muslim is attacked , certain sections of the Muslim world in other parts take action into their own hands. Incresingly I am beggining to be vary of the brotherhood( comradeship) of socialism and Islam.

Sunny- I agree the govt should take a strong stance on various Islamic terror groups and also agree no double standards to Hindu terror either. but why stop at that. How about also including Nagaland for Christ and other christian/exttremism in India aswell .
And dont forget about Buddhist extremism in neighbouring Sri Lanka ( JHU etc) aswell. give them a knock asweel.

I think Hindus have long been obscurantist and failed to come to terms with modernity. They have acquired a deep inferiority complex from their inability to resist invaders over the ceturies – Persians, Mughals and British. William Dalrymple puts it this way: “For Naipaul, the Fall of Vijayanagara is part of a long series of failures that he believes still bruises India’s self-confidence. The wound was created by a fatal combination of Islamic aggression and Hindu weakness—the tendency to ‘retreat’, to withdraw in the face of defeat.”
Nobel winner Amartya Sen also laments this Hindu fatalism – the tendency to give up before a superior enemy and retreat into the spiritual realm.

Aji is right about the rampant malnutrition in India. In 2006, UNICEF chief representative to India Cecilio Adorna said: “Under-nutrition was the underlying cause for 50 per cent of the 2.1 million deaths of under-5 year olds in India each year…India accounted to 40 per cent of child malnutrition in the world”

Adorna also stressed that nearly 70 to 80 percent of the Indian girl children are anaemic. Madhya pradesh is the worst off, with scores of deaths recently.
So what’s the point of the moonshots and nuclear deals when India fails to meet the basic needs of its citizens? Are the priorities right?

So let me quote from Arundati Roy’s articles “The New India” from ZSpace (October 2008) and the Repressive State (San Francisco Aug 2004):
” In the pogrom (in Gujarat, March 2002), between 1,500 to 2,000 Muslims were massacred on the streets, women were gang-raped, 150,000 Muslims were driven from their homes and today they live in ghetto conditions, economically and socially ostracized in Gujarat…
”In Iraq, the Americans have 135,000 troops, and in Kashmir, India has something like 700,000 security personnel of different kinds: the army, the police, the paramilitary, the counterinsurgency… in a situation that almost amounts to war, an estimated 80,000 people have been killed since 1989. Thousands have simply disappeared.”

That should have alerted Mr Tharoor to the accumulated anger waiting to explode in vengeful acts.
And it finally did. Was the retribution disproportionate?

That’s plenty of opportunity to divide and conquer them via drawing some into a negotiation process…

This presumes their demands are reasonable or achievable; whilst i woulddn’t rule out hearing what their rhetoric of the day is or what the reason is for them charging into hospitals to kill innocent – and wounded – people; the fact they say they’re open to negotiation is in itself meaningless. The original and ‘demand’ by Bin Laden was the withdrawl of US troops from Saudi Arabia, he didn’t end his desire to destroy the heathens and infidels in the west or east then and i doubt he’ll do so when the US troops leave Iraq.

Pray tell! How do you negotiate with people who don’t want and have no intention of negotiating with you?

So far I’ve seen no one on this thread, think outside the box as prescribed by the terrorist, i.e.: divide and rule.

1. The terrorist who attacked Mumbai were NOT the usual raghead suspects. These dudes were very well versed in the art of war, highly disciplined and professional. Their ( the terrorist) command and control was second to none. They were also very well equipped, which means they were well funded.

2. The intelligence.
2A. None of the international intelligence agencies managed to pick this up. Not Mossad, not the CIA and not MI6. That takes SOME doing.
2B. The terrorist knew the ground better than their adversaries. That takes some degree of INSIDE information (from within India).

3. The targets were both general and specific in nature. Jews wiped out in one part of town while ordinary Indians (CST) were wiped out in another.

4. The way the terrorist entered Mumbai suggest not only that they had some kind of marine training (UK, US, France) but that they came in from Pakistan, having hijacked a local fishing boat.

I think what we have here is a totally different kettle of fish from the usual suspects and I’d go as far to say that we have a new player in town. A dangerous new player, a multi-national new player and a player that operates without borders. So we had ALL better get with the programme quick because these dudes ain’t going nowhere and they WILL be back. Trust me, I’ve got a very bad feeling about this.

India is common source history

Hindus suffer from many social ills discussed above as much as Muslims eg. Shamit, in India whether one is Muslim or Hindu education is a priviledge and not a right. Opportunity can be affected by race, class, caste etc as much as religion. In India (as in BD & Pak) it is often a matter of who you know rather than what you know.

Over 10,000,000 female embryos didn’t get to develop to life in India in the last decade because Hindus terminated them before birth due to religious and cultural preference for boys. Yet these very same Hindus now lecture Muslims about the place of women in society!!!! This holocaust is not a problem for South Asian Muslims (though there are obviously issues about womens rights amongst our people….and the Hindus too).

Over the same three days this attack in Mumbai took place, thousands of children of all backgrounds in India died from preventable diseases and problems like Cholera, typhus, malnutrition etc. There is as much human agency involved there as much as in the Mumbai incident. India has more pressing issues to address.