India has been facing terrorism for over 30 years now, perhaps lot longer. I am not even sure when it started but it has existed as long back as I remember. Two Indian Prime ministers (head of state in India) have been amongst the 40,000 or so killed in terrorist attacks over the past 20-30 years. Not everything relates to Islamic fundamentalist. Fe w attacks were in retaliation of India’s peacekeeping operation in Sri Lanka, Sikh extremism in Punjab, Naxalite (Communist revolutionaries) insurgencies among others. Majority however are related to Islamic fundamentalist fighting supposedly for rights of ‘Kashmiris’
Kashmir, a beautiful state in northern India, has quite often been called “Paradise on earth”. I lived in the southern part of Kashmir and from what I saw I can easily say it was amongst the most beautiful places I have seen. Kashmir presents an interesting quagmire for anyone to resolve. To be perfectly accurate in the sequence of events I will quote verbatim from Wikipedia
The Kashmir issue
“Ranbir Singh's grandson Hari Singh, who had ascended the throne of Kashmir in 1925, was the reigning monarch in 1947 at the conclusion of British rule of the subcontinent and the subsequent partition of the British Indian Empire into the newly independent Union of India and the Dominion of Pakistan. As parties to the partition process, both countries had agreed that the rulers of princely states would be given the right to opt for either Pakistan or India. In 1947, Kashmir's population "was 77 per cent Muslim and it shared a boundary with Pakistan. Hence, it was anticipated that the Maharaja would accede to Pakistan, when the British paramountcy ended on 14-15 August. When he hesitated to do this, Pakistan launched a guerilla onslaught meant to frighten its ruler into submission. Instead the Maharaja appealed to Mountbatten[9] for assistance, and the Governor-General agreed on the condition that the ruler accede to India."[10] Once the Maharaja signed the Instrument of Accession, which included a clause added by Mountbatten asking that the wishes of the Kashmiri people be taken into account, "Indian soldiers entered Kashmir and drove the Pakistani-sponsored irregulars from all but a small section of the state. The United Nations was then invited to mediate the quarrel. The UN mission insisted that the opinion of Kashmiris must be ascertained, while India insisted that no referendum could occur until all of the state had been cleared of irregulars”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Kashmir_conflict#Rise_of_militancy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurgency_in_Jammu_and_Kashmir
Terrorists groups fighting for Kashmir and based Pakistan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lashkar-e-Toiba
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaish_e_Mohammed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hizbul_Mujahideen
These organizations are banned by India, US and European Union
Others forms of Islamic extremism has emerged
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Mujahedeen
Objective: “Demolish the faith (Hinduism) of India”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Students_Islamic_Movement_of_India
Objective: “Liberation of India’ from western materialistic cultural influence and to convert it into an Islamic society.”
For a full list of terrorist organizations
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_designated_terrorist_organizations
Interesting articale in NY times on the origin on terrorist groups in Pakistan
Obviously the situation is grim, attacks have mounted. This year India faced 7-8 major attacks in several big cities. 4000 innocent civilians have died since 2004. A British report put in India amongst the 20 most dangerous countries to live in the world amongst countries like Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Israel, etc. How did we get here? How does one cope?
This brings to the real topic I wanted to write about. However you will have to wait until my next post.
“India and how we stopped worrying about terror attacks”
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