Writer By Chance.

If there is one ministry under the Modi-led NDA governing apparatus in India, which citizens can truly be proud of, it is the External Affairs Ministry led by the External Affairs Minister, Sushma Swaraj, who is an efficient and a keen toiler. Through seemingly  ruthless, and often raw and  no-nonsense style of functioning, her determination and uncompromising diplomacy have stood in good stead in many a crisis, like when Indian nurses were stranded in war-torn Libya, and Indian priest Tom  Uzhunnalil was abducted by IS operatives in Yemen. In both these crises, she was able to secure the captives’ safe release, much to India’s relief and honor.

She has also been instrumental in facilitating  patients from countries such as Afghanistan, Iran and even our not-too-friendly neighbor Pakistan visit India to avail quality, yet affordable medical care.

When the NDA government is being pulled up for its self-inflicted mess on the economic front, especially by the former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha, himself a BJP man, Indian foreign policy which has been bestowed with great respectability, honor and pride has, to a great extent provided a welcome reprieve and light in the tunnel (I am deliberately avoiding the usage ‘the end of the tunnel’, as the tunnel through which the once invincible Modi-led NDA has been speeding by at breakneck speed and recklessness suddenly has started to assume uncertain course and has been making seemingly retarded progress, that the ‘end of the tunnel’, though not anywhere in sight at the time of writing, could be a real possibility, should the government continue with its brashness and misguided governance, with absolutely antinational and self-destructive  forces like the RSS for advisors. It has resultantly taken on an apologetic, unsure and jittery garb) on its foreign policy front, captained by three women.

It started when the country’s first secretary to the UN, Eenam gambir took on Pakistani’s Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan  Abbasi, when he raked up the vexed Kashmir issue at the UN General Assembly, citing ‘human rights violation’ in Kashmir . Replying to the Pakistani Prime Minister’s concern for ‘human rights’ in Kashmir, a nonexistent commodity in his own country , Gambir called Pakistan ‘terroristan’, as India’s not-so-friendly western neighbor has become a synonym for terror, with a flourishing ‘industry’ producing and exporting global terrorism. Nations sat up to take notice when she continued with her tirade in the floor of the world body ‘it is extraordinary that the state which protected Osama Bin Laden (the slain chief of one of the most ruthless terror outfits- Al Qaeda) and sheltered Mullah Omar (who was the supreme commander and ‘spiritual’ leader of the Taliban) should have the gumption to play victim, with regards to the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Taking a dig at the prefix “Pak”, which means “pure” in Urdu, India through Gambir said Pakistan has long abandoned its aspirations to be moral and virtuous as a nation and instead, its name has become synonymous with terror! The quest for a land of pure has actually produced the ‘land of pure terror’, she said (read derided).

Taking up from where she left off, the Indian External Affairs Minister, Sushma Swaraj took off at the UN. In a takedown of Pakistan for that nation’s relentless support to terrorism, the Minister dismissed Pakistani Prime Minister’s accusations on Human rights violations on India’s part in Kashmir. “Look who’s talking” she pooh-poohed Pakistan. “We are completely engaged in fighting poverty; alas our neighbor Pakistan seems only engaged in fighting us’. She didn’t stop at that. She went on with her blitzkrieg “We set up IITs, IIMs, AIIMS and ISRO. What did Pakistan make? They set up Lashkar-e-taiba(L-E-T), Jaish-e-Mohammed(J-eM), Haqqani network, Hizbul Mujahiddeen”- all various outfits that manufacture terror, export it, and plan it’s execution. She named Pakistan twice in her twelve-minute speech. This is something unprecedented, as countries not in ‘good terms’ do not refer to each other by name, as is the norm in refined diplomacy. But, when mutual respect, trust and patience dries up in bilateral relations between nations, diplomacy too tends to take on a certain degree of abrasiveness, operating through brazen verbal diatribes, and more importantly mistrust, where the tendency to call a ‘spade’, a ‘spade’ takes centre stage, and rightly so. That is exactly what Ms. Swaraj did that day at the UN. The nation, led by Prime Minister Modi praised her for her no-nonsense and matter-of-fact approach, which took Indian foreign policy to respectable heights.

But why did these two women single out Pakistan at the world body?

Did Pakistan deserve the bashing she received at the hands of the Indian diplomat, and the Foreign Minister?

What wrong did Pakistan commit?

India had witnessed the third highest terrorist attacks in 2016, according to the data compiled by the US State Department. Iraq with 2,965 terrorist attacks and Afghanistan with 1,340 attacks were ranked first and second respectively, in terms of being at the receiving end of terrorism. This was followed by India that recorded 927 attacks and Pakistan with 734 attacks. According to the US State Department, more than half of terrorist attack in India took place in four states: Jammu and Kashmir (19%), Chhattisgarh (18%), Manipur (12%), and Jharkhand (10%). The number of terrorist attacks in India increased by 16%, and the number of deaths by 17% in 2016. But, what has India’s western neighbor, Pakistan got to do with India being at the receiving end of terrorism, where an unseen enemy kills and maims innocent lives, audaciously and unexpectedly, catching an entire nation and its defense and policing machinery unawares?

A look at ten worst terrorist attacks India has been subjected to, perhaps would answer that question.

1. 26 November 2008 Mumbai terror attack(famously called the 26/11 attack):

10 Fedayeen terrorists entered Mumbai, the bristling commercial capital city of India, from the sea, killing innocent people however and wherever they possibly could. A series of bomb blasts and gun fire lasted for four days, as a shocked nation and the world watched with terror in their eyes, the dastardly and one of the most audacious and blatantly daring intrusion and violation of a sovereign nation by agents of another, as the events were being telecast almost in real time on television . The terrorists captured Nariman House, Hotel Taj, and Hotel Oberoi Trident, apart from the chhatrapati  Shivaji train terminus, Leopold Café, Cama Hospital, Metro Cinema and the office of the Times Of India. The attack that seemed to be aimed right at the heart of India took 166 lives, and injured 293 Indian and foreign nationals. One attacker Ajmal Kassab was arrested and 9 others killed by the police and NSG Commandos in a long battle. The attack was orchestrated by Pakistan-based terrorist organization, Lashkar-E-taiba(L-e-t), and masterminded by Hafiz Saeed, the cofounder of L-e-T, and chief of Jama’at-ud-Da’wah, and an internationally designated terrorist who operates from Pakistan.

2. 12 March 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blast:

a series of blasts took place in Mumbai in fisherman’s Colony in Mahim causeway, Zaveri Bazaar, Plaza Cinema, Century Bazaar, Katha Bazaar, Hotel Sea Rock, Sahar airport, Air India building, Hotel Juhu Centaur, Worli, Bombai Stock Exchange Building, and passport office. These attacks which killed 257 and injured 713 were coordinated by Dawood Ibrahim, the don of Mumbai-based international organized crime syndicate, the D-Company. Many Indian and Pakistani smugglers funded these attacks, which India believes had the blessings of the Pakistani Intelligence Agency, ISI. It is believed that training and recruitment of terrorists took place in Pakistan and UAE.

3. 24 September 2002 attack on Akshardam Temple in Ahmadabad:

Two terrorists, Murtuza Hafiz Yasin and Ashraf Ali Mohammed Farooq who belonged to the L-E-T and jais-e-Mohammed entered the Aksharam Temple at around 3 PM with automatic weapons and hand grenades. They fired indiscriminately on people, killing 31 and injuring 80. The two miscreants were gunned down by NSG commandos by night. A letter was found which stated that the attack was in ‘revenge’ for the 2002 Gujarat riots. This kind of blatant attack was never seen before in India, and was described as one of the deadliest attacks in India until then.

4. 29 October 2005- Delhi Serial bomb blast:

Just two days before Diwali, a series of three bomb blasts ripped through India’s capital city. Conducted by the Pakistan-based terrorist organization,  Islamic Revolutionary Front, two bombs exploded in the main market of the city- Sarojini Nagar and Paharganj. The third one exploded in a bus in govundpuri. The Govindpuri attack’s casualties were minimized because of the passengers’ and conductor’s presence of mind, who had people evacuate the bus on spotting a suspicious bag inside the bus. Even then, in all, 63 people were killed and 210 injured.

5. 11 July 2006-Bombay train blast:

A series of 7 bomb blasts took place in Mumbai’s, (the new name of the city of Bombay) local trains on July 2006.This was the biggest terrorist attack after the 1993 blast in that city. All the bombs were planted in the first class coach of local trains inside pressure cookers! The bombs exploded at or in the near vicinity of the suburban railway stations of Matunga Road, Mahim, Bandra, Khar Road, Jogeshwari, Bhayander and Borivali. These blasts which killed 210, and injured 715 were carried out by the banned terrorist organization Indian Mujahedeen.

6. 13 May 2008-Jaipur Blast:

A series of nine synchronized bomb blasts ripped through Jaipur in a span of 15 minutes. A tenth bomb did not go off as it was defused by the forces. That one of India’s most popular tourist destinations was targeted came as a bitter realization to the nation. One of the bombs went off near Hawa Mahal, an iconic monument of India. bombs went off at Bari Choupar,Manak Chowk police station area, Johari Bazar, tripolia Bazaar, Choti Choupar, and Kotwali areas, killing 63 and injuring 210.The blasts were synchronized in such a way that possible safe places to which people would run to after each blast were planted with the consecutive blast, such that one of the worst terror attacks unfolded inside a numbed nation .  Initial investigations by the police suggested the involvement of several Islamic militant organizations like the Bangladesh-based Harkat-ul-jihad-al-Islami, Student’s Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), Pakistan-based L-e-T, and al-Queda.

7. 10 October 2008-Assam bombings:

On October 10, 2008, Gawahati, the capital of Assam was targeted. 81 were killed and 470 injured in a serial bomb blasts that involved as much as 18 blasts in crowded places like markets in Guwahati, Barpeta Road, Bongaigaon, and Kokrajhar. With no one claiming responsibility for the dastardly attack, investigations seemed to suggest the involvement of the National ‘Democratic Front’ of Bodoland(strange are the names terror groups, out to kill and maim absolute innocents take on. One wonders what kind of ‘Democracy’ the front was trying to espouse through terrorism; strange indeed are their ways!)

8. 13 December 2001- attack on Indian Parliament:

9. 5 terrorists belonging to Pakistan-based L-e-T and jaish-e-Mohammed (one fails to fathom the crude mindset that goes into having an outfit whose very institution is to kill fellow human beings, named after the prophet (considered sacrosanct to Muslims) attacked the most important institution of Independent India-the Parliament. The enemy seemed hell-bent to have the very heart of India terrorized. That the five managed to reach the Parliament using fake stickers of Parliament and the Home Ministry exposed the chinks in the armor of National security, which the nation could ill-afford. As all the five invaders were killed, casualty was minimal with 6 policemen and 3 Parliament staff dying in the shootout that lasted for hours. At the time of the attack, the then Home Minister, L K Advani and Minister of state for Defense, Harin Patha were inside the building. That none of the terrorists could enter the building was a matter of great relief.

The attack was masterminded by Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri separatist. He was later convicted in his role in the attack and judicially executed by the Indian state, and rightfully so. His mortal remains lie buried within the precincts of Delhi’s Tihar Jail. The attack on Indian Parliament surely remains the most daring, audacious and defying attack on Indian statehood.

10. 14 February 1998-Coimbatore bombings:

An Islamic fundamentalist outfit, Al Ummah conducted a series of 12 bomb blasts at 11 different locations in Coimbatore. The target of the blast seemed to be BJP leader L K Advani who was in the city that day for electioneering. As most of the blasts occurred in Hindu-dominated areas, the victims were mostly Hindus. Luckily, communal mayhem, which could have resulted in such madness did not materialize, much to the nation’s relief, and great disappointment tothe brains behind the blasts.

11. 1 October 2001- J&K Legislative Assembly attack:

Militants belonging to the Pakistan-based jaish-e-Mohammed attacked the Legislative Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir in Srinagar. The attack carried out by suicide bombers, who used a car bomb killed themselves and 38 others, along with the health of an already cachectic Indo-Pak relations.

To take the list of terror attacks carried out inside Indian territory by Pakistan through proxy, the one carried out on part of the western Air Command of the Indian Air Force at Pathankot on 2 January, 2016, stands out. Six attackers dressed in Indian Army fatigues with some 50 kg of ammunition, 30 kg of grenades, and assault weapons viz: grenade launchers, 52 mm mortars, AK47 rifles and a UPS devise managed to scale the tall walls of the Pathankot air base at 3:30 Indian Standard Time. They were able to move 400 meters into the base through a forested area, before they were stopped by guard commandos about 700 meters away from an Indian Air Force aircraft. That an inside job was involved was evident from a fact that the floodlights that would have lit up the stretch of the wall used by the infiltrators had not ‘worked properly’ that early morning.

Maulana Masood Azar, chief of Jaish-e-Mohamed (JeM) and his brother Abdul Rauf Asghar, mastermind of IC-814 hijack case(strange that the business of terrorism is adopted as ‘family business’ by a few motivated in wrong ways!) are among the four identified by Indian intelligence agencies as handlers. Indian Defense Minister, Manohar Parrikar even claimed that some of the materials used in the attack were in fact made in Pakistan!    The attack had the nation shell-shocked. For the target was none other than one of her defense establishments. The nation realized the wile and the guile of her neighbor, which had turned her sworn enemy, hell-bent on disrupting any semblance of possibility of peaceful coexistence in the subcontinent, and also the involvement of ‘local players’, who turn traitors in such daring infringements into national security. And more importantly, her honor.

The other daring attack on Indian nationhood was the incident in which an Indian Airlines flight IC-814 enroute from the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, Nepal  to Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi was hijacked by gunmen belonging to the al Qaeda-linked Harkat-ul-Mujahideen shortly after it entered Indian airspace at 17:30 IST on 24 December 1999. The gunmen had the plane land in several locations at Amritsar, Lahore and Dubai. The hijackers released 27 of 176 passengers in Dubai, but fatally stabbed one, and wounded several others. The aircraft was finally grounded at the Taliban-controlled Kandahar in Afghanistan. The motive of the hijack drama was to secure the release of ‘Islamist’ figures held in Indian prisons. The crisis ended after India shamelessly agreed to release three militants-Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheik, and Masood Azar, all of them curiously Muslims. What is the reason behind the propensity of only Muslims to play willing marionettes in the hands of their masters across the borders? Surely it had to be the fact that these cowardly ‘masters’, who operate by proxy too have to be of the same faith. Curiously and ironically, religion seems to be a driving force behind such disruptive activities.  The nation which encourages, and inside which these masters manufacture and export terror into the Indian Territory surely has to be the Muslim dominated Pakistan. The whole world knows about this from various documented evidence the victim, which is India, has made available to Pakistan (through voluminous dossiers), who habitually distances herself and denies her involvement in these gory attacks. It was only because the victim was always India that these attacks carried out by cowards in the dark, through others went off without retribution, despite numerous threats. India did not choose to violate territorial integrity of another nation just like the US did when her helicopter-borne seals sneaked into Abottabad deep inside Pakistan to kill the terrorist, whose organization was responsible for bringing down the twin towers in new York-Osama Bin Laden.    It was only because of India’s love for peace and her culture of nonviolence inculcated into her very soul by her Father of the Nation that she chooses to turn the other cheek despite adequate reasons to retaliate. India is a much mature and buoyant democracy, which has always been governed by sensible people through a valid electoral system unlike Pakistan. ‘Democracy’ of that nation, on the other hand has always been fickle and weak-kneed to be at the receiving end of the grandiose designs of her adventurous and reckless army generals, drunk on presiding over the disintegration of her vastly developed and accomplished neighbor, which India is. This is exactly why Sushma Swaraj and Eeman Gambir reserved the right to rip open Pakistan’s duplicity,  lie and well proven hand-in-glove involvement in not only exporting terror into India, but in also ensuring it’s foolproof execution before the rest of the civilized nations gathered at the UN.

Far removed from the UN, the US Defense Secretary, James Mattis was welcomed and received by the Indian counterpart, Ms. Nirmala Sitharaman. The US had all along being nudging India to ‘participate’ in the process of rebuilding a war-ravished Afghanistan militarily than humanely. Ms. Sitaraman conveyed to the visitor in no uncertain terms that ‘there shall not be any Indian boots on the ground in Afghanistan’, and that Indian engagement in Afghanistan would continue through medical assistance and contributing towards Afghanistan’s nation building through constructive means, other than the destructive military ones. The Indian defense minister thus reiterated India’s reputation as a nation that has never been an aggressor ever, in her history, but has only been the victim of external aggression, other than through the aforesaid terrorist mayhem, and frequent ongoing intrusions in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, and by the British East India Company’s expansionist ways, the Mughals’ invasion of India, and also through full-fledged wars such as those with Pakistan in 1947, 1965, and1971 (to liberate Bangladesh), and with China in 1962. The Defense minister held out a helping hand, only in terms of humanitarian aid, which contributes to nation building constructively, but held back resolutely, military involvement in a country already ripped apart by meaningless armed interference by foreign forces. She lived up to Indian reputation as a peace broker, and a succor in times of need to impoverished and war torn nations. By doing so, Ms. Sitaraman joined Sushma Swaraj and Eanam Gambhir in taking Indian foreign policy under the Modi-led NDA to reputable and new heights.