(Dr. Shashi Tharoor is a two-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram, the Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs, the former Union Minister of State for External Affairs and Human Resource Development and the former UN Under-Secretary-General. He has written 14 books, including, most recently, Pax Indica: India and the World of the 21st Century.)So one more 26/11 has passed by, the commemorations seemingly a little less intense with each passing year.
Every year since 26 November 2008, I have undertaken a personal pilgrimage to the city of Mumbai. This year, I had to be in Parliament in Delhi, but my thoughts were very much on a city on our Western coast, where ten Pakistani men carrying bags of deadly weaponry disembarked from a small dinghy exactly six years ago to bring murder and mayhem to our shores.
"26/11", as we call it now, was the day when this city, representing the best and the brightest of our civilizational values, was attacked in an act of terror unmatched in its ruthlessness and savagery.
Since then, for me this day has been a day of resolve and remembrance. Every year on this day I have returned to Mumbai to pay homage to the brave martyrs of our security forces and to the innocent victims of this cowardly attack. Too many people think that you can do anything to India, and Indians will in time forgive and forget. My visits to Mumbai every year on this day - attending memorials, participating in ceremonies and rallies, quietly visiting the sites that were attacked, speaking to some of the survivors -- are a personal affirmation of my belief that we must never forget.
The sacrifices and senseless slaughter that Mumbai witnessed on those fateful three days must never be forgotten. The lone surviving perpetrator, Ajmal Kasab was hanged in 2012, but the masterminds of this bloodletting still find sponsorship, sanctuary and support across the border. As long as they roam free, no proud Indian can forgive or forget. The spirit of India, the idea of India, are not vanquished by this act: if anything it has brought us together to an unprecedented level of solidarity.
For most Indians, terrorism was defined in blood on the night of 26/11. While most of the nation was glued to an India-England ODI in Cuttack, news came of some gunfire in South Mumbai. Initial reports suggested a gun battle between rival gangs. But the unfolding events showed our darkest fears coming true. The city that never sleeps did not blink an eyelid as it watched, with shock and horror, its most beloved and iconic landmarks being devastated by an orgy of death and destruction. It was a night lasting 68 hours, whose nightmares continue to haunt and horrify our collective consciousness.
The terrorists, who heaved their bags laden with weapons up the steps of the wharf to begin their assault on the Taj, knew exactly what they were doing. Theirs was an attack on India's financial nerve-centre and commercial capital, a city emblematic of the country's energetic thrust into the 21st century. They struck at symbols of the prosperity that was making the Indian model so attractive to the globalising world - luxury hotels, a swish café, an apartment house favoured by foreigners. The terrorists also sought to polarise Indian society by claiming to be acting to redress the grievances, real and imagined, of India's Muslims. And by singling out Britons, Americans and Israelis for special attention, they demonstrated that their brand of Islamist fanaticism is anchored less in the absolutism of pure faith than in the geopolitics of hatred.
That year on 26/11, the platitudes flowed like blood. Terrorism is unacceptable; the terrorists are cowards; the world stands united in unreserved condemnation of this atrocity. Commentators in America tripped over themselves to pronounce this night and day of carnage "India's 9/11." But India has endured many attempted 9/11s, notably a ferocious assault on our national Parliament in December 2001 that nearly led to all-out war against the assailants' presumed sponsors, Pakistan.
In 2008 alone, terrorist bombs took lives in Jaipur, in Ahmedabad, in Delhi and (in an eerie dress-rehearsal for the effectiveness of synchronicity) several different places on one searing day in the state of Assam. Jaipur is the lodestar of Indian tourism; Ahmedabad is the primary city of Gujarat, the state that is a poster child for India's development, with a local GDP growth rate of 14%; Delhi is the nation's political capital and India's window to the world; Assam was logistically convenient for terrorists from across a porous border. Mumbai combined all the four elements of its precursors: by attacking it, the terrorists hit India's economy, its tourism, and its internationalism, and they took advantage of the city's openness to the world. A diabolical grand slam.
So the terrorists hit multiple targets in Mumbai, both literally and figuratively. They caused death and destruction to our country, searing India's psyche, showing up the limitations of its security apparatus and humiliating its government. They dented the worldwide image of India as an emerging economic giant, a success story of the era of globalisation and an increasing magnet for investors and tourists. Instead the world was made to see an insecure and vulnerable India, a "soft state" bedevilled by enemies who could strike it at will.
But terrorism and India have had a long history. We Indians have learned to endure the unspeakable horrors of terrorist violence ever since malignant and delusional men in Pakistan, wearing the khaki of military honour and the clerical robes of piety, concluded, after four unsuccessful wars, that it was cheaper and more effective to bleed India to death than to attempt to defeat it in conventional war. Attack after attack has been proven to have been financed, equipped and guided from across the border.
Of course India can recover from the physical assaults against it. It is a land of great resilience that has learned, over arduous millennia, to cope with tragedy. When the terrorists have tried to create panic in any corner of the nation, this spirit of the people has consistently defied their purpose. Bombs and bullets alone cannot destroy India, because Indians will pick their way through the rubble and carry on as they have done throughout history.
But what can destroy India is a change in the spirit of its people, away from the pluralism and co-existence that has been our greatest strength. That these tragic events never led to the demonisation of the Muslims of India was vital, for if it had done so the terrorists would have won.
So I go to Mumbai every 26/11 to reaffirm the human spirit, the inclusive Indian spirit - the spirit of Mumbai. The phrase "never again" has been used elsewhere across the world. Every November 26, it resonates in every Indian heart. Let us mourn what happened in Mumbai five years ago. Let us pay homage to all the victims of this senseless outrage and tribute to those who overcame the terror. But at the same time let us strive together to ensure that it never happens again.
I have no doubt that whoever governs India, this spirit will not die. We will create a safe, prosperous and just India. In doing so we will ensure that the politics of hope will always prevail over the purveyors of hatred. India will be a beacon of strength and stability for the rest of the subcontinent. I want 26/11 to be marked not merely by reflection and mourning, but by also celebrating and reaffirming our faith in the idea of India.
On 26/11/2008, we lowered our heads in mourning. Every 26/11 to come, let us raise them again in hope.
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