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SHOUT OUT LOUD!
On November 26th, 2008 a bunch of very clever psychotic monsters decided to burn down a city. They decided to make a whole country squeal while they watched and laughed. They decided to show a government it's true worth. They did it and they did it well. And they made sure to put up a good show.
The cries would be too brief to savor. So they stretched the span of the attack...so that minute after minute, hour after hour, each squeak, each cry of horror could be relished.
Like vampires and slayers that until now only lived in our imaginations, they killed and slayed for fifty nine hours. What went on in their minds, what level of hatred drove them and kept them going, what substance kept them infuriated, what power they must've felt through the hours; are things we can only wonder.
The bottomline is, they walked into our territory like kings, slapped us on our faces, snatched away our weapons from us, murdered our people in cold blood, and then became martyrs for their jihad, which they were all along prepared for.
What's left of the tragedy is over a thousand mourning families, a widespread wave of frustration, chaos all over the country, and people like you and me, protesting at public rallies, giving opinions and reading those of others.
They succeeded. And we failed.
With a population as large as ours, it's impossible to keep a check on everyone's movements. The attack was so meticulously planned, it perhaps couldn't be avoided. A lot of people can be blamed - politicians, armed forces, coastguards, the police, media...the list is endless.
But the truth is, after the attack, what needed to be done wasn't done.
The elongated operation was a display of the absolute inefficiency of our entire system to deal with an extreme situation like this one. From where I see it, the biggest drawback of the operation was letting the media get so intricately involved. When the presence of clear communication amongst the terrorists from their various stations became apparent, the first thing that should've been done was to keep the media from giving minute to minute news of the operation. There was no concept of secrecy in the rescue plan. The terrorists inside were constantly getting informed about everything happening on the outside.
We can go on and on about what "should've been done". But that doesn't get us anywhere, nor does it undo what's been done.
Mr. Manmohan Singh's speech after the disaster was something we could've all done without. Despite all that George Bush did, he was atleast sensitive enough to console his countrymen appropriately when they were made victims of terror.
Mr. R.R. Patil's resignation appears to be the case of a common person screwing up a job at work and then quitting with the fear of facing the consequences. A classic example of escaping responsibility. Basically, he CHICKENED OUT!
Let's not even begin to talk about Mr. Thakrey.
At the end of the day, the common man comes out of his house again. People call it the spirit of Mumbai. But it's not the spirit; common people like you and me get out of the house again because we don't have an option. We are back on the roads again, using trains and buses again, any of which could explode any moment. But we do it only because we are compelled to do it. The common man is compelled by the need to earn his bread.
Any kind of damage control cannot repair what's been broken. If the country doesn't wake up now, it probably never will.
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