India's Iraq Crisis: Let's Keep Our Heads

(Dr. Shashi Tharoor, a two-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram and the former Union Minister of State for External Affairs and Human Resource Development, is the author of 14 books, including, most recently, Pax Indica: India and the World of the 21st Century.)

The country is gripped by one of its periodic bouts of media hysteria, this time over the plight of the 46 Indian nurses in Tikrit and the 41 Indian construction workers in Mosul who have been trapped by the ongoing fighting. Images of crying families and anxious relatives, fear-mongering interviews with recent escapees from Iraq, and headlines about a foreign policy crisis for the new Government have combined to create an atmosphere of panic and desperation that are not exactly conducive to sensible decision-making.

Obviously we all are, and must be, deeply concerned about our fellow citizens caught up in the Iraqi insurgency. The well-being of every Indian in distress, anywhere in the world, is a moral and political responsibility of the Government of India. But this fact must be tempered by a practical, level-headed assessment of what exactly it is reasonable of us to demand from our Government in the ongoing crisis.

In this situation, these are the things the Government of India can realistically do:

-- open lines of communication to the victims and for their families including a 24/7 hotline for ongoing communication;

-- establish contact with the Government of Iraq to obtain information and intelligence about the victims, including their exact locations and means of egress if any;

-- contact institutions with a presence on the ground, such as the UN mission in Iraq, the Red Cross/Red Crescent, and international humanitarian NGOs working in the area, to see if they can provide information and logistical support to the victims;

-- try to arrange secure transport for the victims to a safe airport (this will depend on the state of the fighting in the area, which is beyond the control of the Iraqi authorities);

-- arrange a charter aircraft to that safe airport. Since Baghdad is imperiled, the only viable way out would be from airports in the Kurdish autonomous area -- Erbil and Suleimaniya;

-- and if at all possible, establish contact with those holding our citizens, to arrange for their release from captivity or detention and their safe departure to a secure airport when circumstances permit.

I have no doubt that the Government is doing every single one of the things above.  If it's not, it should be doing so without any delay, but I have enough faith in the competence of the Ministry of External Affairs to believe these are precisely the efforts it is already making.

India has neither the military presence in the area nor the logistical capacity to try a "Boy's Own Adventure" intervention-and-rescue operation with paratroopers, since we will not have armoured vehicles on the ground to move the rescued nor be able to fly in the firepower to overcome the insurgents.

The steps I have outlined above are therefore what I would urge the Government to pursue, and we should support the MEA's efforts to do so rather than panic and make unfeasible demands. We need to avoiding losing our heads; in the words of the current hit rap song, 'Keep Calm' should be our motto.

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