IC814 Kandahar story

 At the turn of the millennium in 1999 on Christmas eve an Indian aircraft flying from Kathmandu to Delhi was hijacked. I recollect this story very well and the abiding memory till today is on of the bungling state and monumental incompetence in handling the problem at hand.The problem of partition and Hindu Muslim communal divide has been responsible for so much violence, loss of life, livelihood and economic strife for almost over 175 years. While I have failed to understand why people think in this way, I recall this story of an author Aanchan Malhotra and her book about the Partition stories through material memories. We have always found it difficult to differentiate between the abstract and the concrete. There is an in built biased thinking among many of us about Muslims and the Muslims maybe harbouring the same for Hindus. In her book on her visit to Lahore she was in a typical social gathering where Indians in general and Hindus in particular were othered and abused. But the host on realising the presence of Aanchan said "Beti yeh sab baatein aap ke liye nahin hain kyoki aap to acche ho". Would this same discrimination occur when we are consumed by anger and are encouraged to attack the other based on a shared hatred or embedded belief that they are different and they need to just about be tolerated or if need be eliminated. 

The litany of action reaction and the never ending saga of revenge and retribution makes all stakeholders losers. While this incident is quite fresh in my memory and many of the politicians of that Government were very promising leaders, the Government and it's disaster and counter terrorist agencies were found wanting and bungled big time. 

To my recollection the context of the events of Kandahar has been a result of the never ending communal conflict of India and the Kashmir problem linked to it. The very basis of the Indian state and democracy is that there is no difference between the rights of citizens based on religion and all are allowed to practice their religion without unreasonable infringement on the rights of its fellow citizens. At the time of independence a majority Muslim state Jammu and Kashmir ruled by an unpopular Hindu King chose under pressure of invasion by tribals from Pakistan who posing as non state actors started targeting non muslims. The Indian army took over the state and Sheikh Abdullah became Prime Minister. 

In 1998 the PM was the poet philosopher Atal Bihari Vajpayee who took over from his wise friend Narasimha Rao and ensured India has nuclear weapons. This alienated many a Western power and we were in a way isolated from the world.  Despite heading a right wing party Vajpayee as head of a coalition government was a pragmatist and he knew that ultimately peaceful co-existence was the way forward. The bus drive to Lahore a gesture of goodwill was followed by a betrayal in the form of Kargil war by Pakistan. This was the handiwork of ISI and Pakistan army and Navaz Sharif pleaded not being in control. The Indian army showed immense courage in the face of adversity and intelligence failure and not only did they manage to push back Pakistan but managed to capture dreaded terrorists  and international pressure made Pakistan eat humble pie. After the Kargil war came this hijacking episode. The Government led by military ruler Pervez Musharraf  who had lost in Kargil. Later,The attack on Parliament led to a kind of border high alert situation with troops on both sides in an eyeball to eyeball proximity. 

There are two things which I distinctly remember from those days are the fact that as a nation we seemed to have goofed up in our early response. The images on television of public anger and the example of how when present PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti daughter of Mufti Mahmood syed a then Congress leader was kidnapped terrorists were released to get her freedom. The Government of the day had a Hobson's choice and at least the serial on Netflix does not show the Government of the day in a poor light, the images of Jaswant Singh foreign minister actually accompanying the three dreaded terrorists was humiliating. 

The price paid by India and the loss of morale for the army men must be very big. Public memory is short but I remember the Kargil war hero Ajay Ahuja's widow pleading with the relatives to not put pressure on the government to release such dreaded terrorists. 

While it may be easy to act heroic but nobody thought of putting the nation's interest first among the families of hostages. The cycle of retaliation is always a zero sum game this is still going on in conflicts all over the world. I only remember a lone passenger who regretted that his freedom came at a heavy cost for the nation. 

How does a Gandhi deal with such terrorists? Can voluntary laying down of life change the heart of terrorists? Was there a bit of Stockholm Syndrome and were some passengers ready to become sympathisers with terrorist? At least the serial suggests this did happen but to what extent is unknown. 

Finally, the solution to this problem lies in not having different dealings between the abstract members of a certain group and concrete individuals. So as a community Muslims deserve maltreatment which is swift and severe but an individual Muslim friend comes into our lives we will never act as badly as when we hear of riots or mob attacks. 

As in my previous blog on violence the same paradigm of universal love holds true. We are living in a world where there is a total lack of intellect and we are constantly running after desires and so we feel unsatisfied agitated and angry and all this comes out in the form of violence and retaliation. Again we need to be the change we want to see in others. 

As I said out to write this blog, I was planning to make a fictionalised account of how things could have been different if 4 persons were aboard the flight. One a pacifist Gandhian, another a right wing fundamentalist, third an American Sikh and one who is fed on image of American superiority and last a charmer and sweet talker doctor who saves the life of the slain hostage by performing a heroic surgery in the most compromised operation conditions. The interplay of these guys and their effects on each of them creating divisions in the ranks of the hijackers eventually leading to divisions in their ranks. The most educated guy hears the message of the Mahatma especially when the whole plane in a meditative phase rings with the bhajan Ishwar Allah Tero naam Sabko Sanmati de Bhagwan. The message of Islam not to kill innocents resonates in the hearts of all. The Fundamentalist Hindu is reminded of the message of Vivekananda. The American Sikh acknowledges that his government also has been wrong in it's acts of backing Israeli forces in the violence against the muslims in Gaza.  The last of them is the glue that binds these messages and urges the terrorists to give up their ways and promised that they would not be punished and allowed to meet their captive friends. Also, the recovery of Rupen and the fact that the terrorist hijackers were not having the blood or sin of killing even one innocent guy tilted the scales in favour of a positive final outcome. Finally, the Indian government gives a written assurance of amnesty and forgiveness on condition that these guys become informers and are given refuge in India and become ambassadors of peace. Is this possible? Yes, the story of the Pathans led by Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan led to one of the most successful non violent resistance in the world by Red shirts called Khudai Khidmatgars or Servants of God. 

Romantic as it may sound I feel that awakening the good in all and Self realisation is the only way forward to reach the goal. 

Dr. Vispi Jokhi