Car Conferences

Ever since 26/11 happened, it looks like every neta is scrambling to air his views on the catastrophe, for example ex-MH Deputy CM RR Patil with his infamous comments about big cities and small events like 26/11, or Lalu with his views that the role of the opposition was "suspicious".

But Minority Affairs Minister AR Antulay has entered a completely different league by repeating exactly what has been the talking point of Pakistan's conspiracy theorists:

“There is more than what meet the eyes... Karkare was investigating some cases in which non-Muslims were involved,” he said. The minister then went on to explain why he is not in agreement with the view that Karkare was killed by terrorists. “Superficially speaking, they (terrorists) had no reason to kill Karkare. Whether he (Karkare) was victim of terrorism or terrorism plus something. I do not know,” he said.

[link]

Predictably, this has set the cat among the pigeons with the opposition demanding his head. The political capital that can be made out of this is imaginable, so it's easy to understand what is driving the BJP to ask for his resignation. But what is disheartening is that most common people are also confining themselves to just asking for Antulay to be sacked or disciplined.

They are simply not seeing the real problem. The real problem, the real question we need to be asking is, what authority does the Minister for Minority Affairs have to speak on a terror attack while the investigations are going on? What authority does this Minister have to comment on a situation in which we are on a diplomatic offensive with Pakistan? This would hardly have been acceptable from a newbie politician, but Antulay is a veteran and should have known when not to comment. What made him and Lalu believe they had the right to comment on this issue?

This is not, I believe, a problem with the people alone. It is a problem with the process. This is the first thing I felt when I heard of Antulay's comments but couldn't put a finger on exactly where the problem in the process lay. Until yesterday, when I watched Times Now.

Apparently, Lalu Yadav had just arrived at Parliament and as usual, his car was beseiged by journos asking him for his comments on Antulay. Lalu gave no answer and silently walked into the building. The journos were gushing, in that now-commonplace high-pitched Sunny Deol-esque shouting voice, that it was very uncharacteristic of Lalu to do so. If true, then it would be one of the few rare occassions that Lalu kept mum when he should have.

A few moments later, there appeared footage of Foreign Minister Pranabda, again apparently in front of a car, with cameras thrust in his face. Now Pranabda in my opinion, is a poor choice for a Foreign Minister, a job that is as much PR as it is strategy. These days he looks positively uncomfortable, if not scared, when facing the camera. This isn't helped least by his relatively short height, which only increases the impression of his discomfort.

But coming back, that's when it hit me. It is perhaps these comments at the car which are the reason why Antulay and co believe entitled to comment on issues like 26/11.

Why? To answer that, let's go back to Times Now's reaction at Lalu's silence. The reporter kept asking why Lalu remained silent. Not once did it dawn on him or the studio anchor that the correct question should have been, why shouldn't Lalu have remained silent? Lalu is not the PM or the HM, he is not responsible for the investigation into the terror attacks or Karkare's death, so why should he comment upon another Minister's statements anyway?

The rot begins at the reporters. Car conferences are easy - you need to ambush a neta for barely 15 seconds before he disappears into the building. Once you do that you have footage that can be played on endless loop (Times Now displayed Lalu's silence thrice as I watched). They play on the egotistical nature of our netas who cannot resist the temptation of seeing themselves on TV and making statements.

The trouble is that car conferences are not a mode of information dissemination. Think about it, how measured a response can be given at a car conference within those 15 seconds? None, of course. All that can be done at a car conference is a sound-bite. Which is good for the TRPs but is utterly useless when it comes to information dissemination.

If the rot begins at the reporters, it continues with the politicians. Now that they have been brought up on a diet of car conferences where any and every Minister can be ambushed at his car, Ministers start making comments about any and every issue, whether under their purview or not.

The worst part of all this is that there is no accountability involved from the Minister's end. Unlike a formal press conference which is called by the relevant Ministry and demands accountability, a car conference is ad-hoc, it is done not at the Minister's choice but at the whims of the media. This would be a fine thing if the media were mature enough to ask the right people, but they aren't. What they want is sound-bites and the car conference is a medium which serves only that purpose.

The same attitude of no accountability carries on into the Parliament. Antulay gave his unsubstantiated and unstudied opinions on a subject he does not handle and had no business to be handling, because this culture of asking a Minister his view on any and every issue encourages it. The car interview encourages this mindset and this culture, and it encourages the sound-bite. When this happens, Ministers like Antulay want their share of publicity, so they say any and everything that comes to their mind. Obviously there are bound to be conflicting signals coming from the govt.

On the other hand, real information dissemination like a press conference called by a Ministry is rarer, and lesser covered in the media. If you get it, you mostly get snatches - again, soundbites. A press conference is where a detailed, and most importantly "official" (which means there is some accountability to go with it) response is given. Why are these not covered much? One, because car interviews are easier to get (you don't need to sit through a conference) and because the chances of getting juicy stuff (would Antulay be invited to press conference by the Home Ministry?) reduce. Unfortunately, the atmosphere of informality surrounding them directly encourages loose comments. It looks like the same culture is being carried over into the Parliament.

Times Now gleefully showed the number of embarrassing U-turns Zardari took, but Antulay might just have given India's answer to that.

As I said, this is a problem of the process, not of the people. Loose comments will continue to be made as long as the process is screwed up.

So how do you fix the process? One, for every major security issue, within hours if not minutes, the govt must decide which department(s) are authorised to comment on the issue in the media. In this case, it would be the Foreign, Home and PMO. Each of these could further subdivide which aspects each would handle. There are bound to be internal disagreements with other departments, but these should be brought out at the Cabinet, especially when heated negotiations with Pakistan are involved. There had better be an extremely good reason for them to air their differences in public. Two, innuendo by Ministers on ongoing investigations by other departments must be prohibited. What Antulay said, or Lalu's comment about the "suspicious" role of the opposition were innuendos, and they smack of utter irresponsbility and unaccountability. Three, car conferences need to be done away with. They serve absolutely no purpose other than TRPs. They do not spread information. They are more sound than light. To do away with them is not difficult - all Ministers need to do is keep quiet from the car to the building and ignore the reporters' questions, unless they refer to their own departments or are personal questions, in which case it is their choice. If information needs to be spread, let it be done by the concerned relevant departments at a press conference where they give it with reliability and most important, accountability.

This might have an additional positive side effect. Pranabda communicating exclusively through a press conference might look far less uncomfortable and initimidated than when he has a hundred mikes staring him in the face.

Insaniyat

Scenario 1: A gangster and extortionist is killed in a fake encounter in the great state of Gujarat. Human rights organizations and other such bleeding hearts go on a rampage likening the Chief Minister to Hitler.

Scenario 2: The great state of Maharashtra, famous for its encounter specialists (one of whom died in the recent Mumbai attacks) does not have any of its Chief Ministers in the last 10 years called a Hitler.

Scenario 3: The great state of Andhra Pradesh refuses an enquiry into the murder in police custody of the three accused in the acid attacks case. Something tells me YSR isn't going to be painted in Hitlerian garb either.

Now while the rule of law needs to be maintained and fake encounters are entirely condemnable, it is an open question as to why the human rights of Sohrabuddin trump the human rights of the victims of MH's encounter specialists or the acid attack perpetrators.

Picking up the pieces

It's now two weeks since 26/11 and now, things are coming back to what we would term "normal". The hysteria whipped up by the media seems to be dying down as the much-famed "resilience" of the nation kicks into action, and nothing indicates this more than the elections in Delhi and Rajasthan, which happened after the Mumbai attacks and yet gave thumping victories to the Congress.

In less dark times, the US would have given us the standard song-and-dance about "restraint" while "strongly condemning" the "vicious" acts of terror. But these are not less dark times, and so between the escalating tension in this region and the impending change of guard in DC, the US needs to put up a better item number. Rakhi Sawant and Bipasha won't do; what's needed is Angelina Jolie dancing to the tune of Beedi Jalaile.

Pakistan, too has been giving us more. Instead of showing India the finger, they've coated the finger with honey hoping we'll lick it. The US at this moment is doing little more than pacifying matters, knowing fully well that once the hot-headed Indians cool down, the government will be more than willing to emulate a drunk Kumbhakarna. Pakistan, on the other hand, is doing the most it can to look like it's doing a lot, while actually doing zilch.

Pakistan's prompt arrest of Maulana Masood Azhar and Lakhvi, though, does suggest one thing - the theory that the LeT is out of the control of the Army and ISI, is bogus. Lakhvi and Azhar were not at all difficult to find and catch when Pakistan needed to do it for the sake of the cameras. What this proves, in case someone was still in doubt, that Pakistan is very much in bed with the holy warriors. It may be a rocky marriage, but they're not headed for a divorce any time soon.

A lot of very interesting things have emerged in the last few weeks.

For instance, Mr Dus Pratishat's piece in NYT echoing his now oft-repeated claim about non-state actors, about Pakistan being a victim of terror and other such standard fare. Credit where it is due, Mr. Z has written very well; his piece is one of the finest examples of spin doctoring, claiming that the attacks in Mumbai were directed at his country as well. This view has received the blessings of Condi, though of course it has nothing to do with the fact that the soon-to-be Obama-nation needs Pakistan's help in Afghanistan. However, Indians would do well not to buy the snake-oil and start pining with love for our peace-loving neighboring country. There are victims and then there are victims. A country which made terrorism a cottage industry was going down on its knees and begging for trouble. A country which invested in Jihadis and Mujahideens instead of doctors and engineers is bound to get what it deserved. If someone bangs your head on a hard rock, you could legitimately be called a victim. If you bang your own head on a hard rock, then you can hardly call yourself a victim.

So let's not get into pangs of heartbreak over the fact that Pakistan is now at the receiving end too - that is a monster of their own creation. At the moment, the interest of India is indeed in working with Pakistan (if they are ready to work in a meaningful manner) and bringing down the terrorists, but for our sake, not for Pakistan's sake.

Then there is this one Gnani Sankaran who advances the scholarly thesis that the Taj is not an icon of India because most Indians cannot go there. Perhaps Gnani Sankaran therefore does not believe that the Rashtrapati Bhavan is an icon of India, since most people don't go there either.

The paradoxically-named author also goes on to expand his thesis to suggest that the coverage of the Taj was because it was the "elites" who were for the first time targeted, and that the other icon of India, CST, was ignored because the elites were not involved there. I wonder which version of the attacks coverage Mr Sankaran saw, because the countless email forwards and photos shown on tv in endless loops included grainy pictures of an area that looked suspiciously like CST, and featured one Ajmal Amir. Times Now, headed by Arnab Goswami, was repeating ad nauseam the few seconds of footage from CST with the terrorists helpfully circled in red. I personally saw this footage no less than 50 times, and I wasn't even watching it continuously.

Also, in his enthusiasm to vent his class warfare bile, the author seems to have forgotten that we just witnessed 60 hours of a live hostage situation involving (as Shivraj Patil helpfully told everyone) 200 commandos. Anywhere in the world this would have attracted media attention. The elite factor may have played a role, especially when it came to the over-coverage of the food critic who died in the Taj. but it is undeniable that what was seen in Mumbai was unprecedented and arresting. Though of course, it is hard for class warriors to appreciate that.

"This city just showed you, that it is still full of people ready to believe in good"

- Batman, in The Dark Knight

One of the good things to have emerged out of this entire affair has been the extremely responsible response of the Muslim community. It has always been a pet complaint of many (including yours truly) that they never condemned the evil acts of their co-religionists with the fervor reserved for Hindu fundamentalists. Though to be fair, the same can also be said of the Hindu leaders.

What stands out this time though, has been the strong anti-terrorist signal being sent across by the Muslim community against these attacks. First it was the refusal to bury the terrorists, which is about as strong a response as can be given. Then it was the suggestion from the Deobandi Ulema to avoid cow slaughter keeping in mind the sentiments of the Hindus. Then it was the decision not to have the Babri Masjid protests this year as a sign of solidarity. Though there is nothing wrong with protesting per se, the Masjid-Mandir issue is a surefire bet to inflame passions, and the act of exercising restraint at this juncture speaks volumes. And it continued up to Id yesterday - many Id congregations in Bangalore prominently displayed at the entrance signs condemning the acts in Mumbai.

The gesture was reciprocated too. Though the media did everything they could to whip up anti-Muslim voices, including getting some "intellectuals" on a stage to repeat the same "why do we have to prove our patriotism" arguments, they didn't succeed much. There was little attempt, if any, to link ordinary Muslims with terror this time. Even the BJP stayed away from taking an overt anti-Muslim line. There is of course a lunatic fringe which will continue to exist, but that fringe has been marginalized more than ever before.

If the aim of terrorists was to humiliate and embarrass India, they did succeed. They exposed the chinks in our armor and made it look like child's play.

Yet India did prove resilient, in a completely different way. The almost complete absence of communal tones in the aftermath of 26/11 suggests an evolving, maturing society that seems to be learning from history. So do the election results in RJ and DL, which show that we are not voting on knee-jerk sentiments. It seems Indians see through the fake claims of the BJP on terrorism, having remembered that it was a BJP Minister who escorted terrorists to Kandahar.

So if the aim of terrorists was to destroy religious harmony, they have made a major miscalculation. It seems 26/11 has just brought India closer. The only question now is how long this newfound maturity will last.

Watch the world burn

This week's terror attacks in Mumbai are indeed unprecedented. For one, the world has been taking much more interest in events now, probably because this time, it isn't just the "Injuns" who are getting killed. As of this writing, there are around 200 deaths in all, including 22 foreigners. They have been dubbed "India's 9/11", though the phrase doesn't convey the uniqueness of these attacks in a country that has seen multiple major terror attacks this year, sometimes up to twice a month.

Another reason why the attacks are unprecedented are in their sheer audacity - terrorists taking control of top hotels of Mumbai, not to mention firing indiscriminately in Mumbai's most important train station, were unheard of before 26 Nov.

At this moment, the dust has still not fully settled. The Taj was sanitized only on the 29th Nov, almost 60 hours since the carnage began. So it is a little difficult to draw too many conclusions, but some thoughts coming in right now are:

1. The counterterrorism machinery: The fact that just four terrorists (the fourth has just been found) could keep the NSG, MARCOS, ATS and Mumbai Police busy for three continuous days and run amok in a 565-room hotel raises serious questions on our entire counterterrorism apparatus.

2. The confidence of the attackers: Planning and executing an operation that involves people entering from the sea, storming Mumbai's most enduring symbols like the Taj and the CST and holding the former for the best part of three days, betrays a huge amount of confidence in the agency conducting the attacks. Most certainly, this has to do with the government's pusillanimous reaction to attacks till now.

3. The attacks also highlight the underwhelming competence of the union Home Minister whose mere presence makes terrorists flee (check the entry at 3:27 pm) and whose actions on the terror front after previous attacks have left no doubts as to his competence on the terror front, not to mention his sartorial taste. If that wasn't enough, Shivraj Patil was even generous enough to tell the terrorists on national television how many commandos (200) had been dispatched. After which, the terrorists were also given ample time to prepare

4. Not to be outdone by his central counterpart and namesake, Maharashtra Home Minister RR Patil sees the whole incident much more philosophically, and tries to do a Shah Rukh Khan-esque "bade bade shehron mein aisi choti choti baatein hoti rehti hain". It also seems that the Centre's warnings to the State government (i.e. RRP's office) are mysteriously disappearing, since RRP allegedly never received any info. Though to be fair, given what we know of the competence of RRP and his central counterpart, the problem could be either at the receiving end or the sending one.

5. And the man in the hotseat, Manmohan Singh delivering the path-breaking explanation that the attackers were from outside India, which sort of contradicts his earlier statement in September 2006 (barely a month after the Mumbai train blasts) that Pakistan was also a "victim of terrorism." Of course, that did not stop him from asking for the ISI's help in the recent case, as we can easily imagine that the ISI would be leaping with joy over the prospect of finding their own people's hands in the cookie jar. Unfortnately MMS's golden dreams couldn't come true because Pakistan decided to turn him down after initially agreeing.

6. The bastion of the free world, protector of democracy and nemesis of terrorism (especially the Islamic variety) fears India's reaction if it were found that Pakistan has a hand in this. Funnily, they didn't exercise much restraint when it came to 9/11. But it's understandable that they would want India to show restraint. After all, it's mostly the brown monkeys who are at the receiving end.

But the Americans don't need to fear. It is unlikely that the Indian govt will do much more than deliver a couple of platitudes about not letting neighbor's territories be used for terror, and that will be about it. For America, there is still a very good chance that India will not be doing anything serious against Pakistan. That is due to the famous "resilience" of Mumbai and India, which is a euphemism for people's necessity to feed their families, and also their capacity to forget everything the moment there is a celebrity controversy, till Rakhi Sawant or some other starlet says something inane.

It is possible, though, that this event being so unprecedented and unexpected, might jolt Indians out of our collective slumber and bovine tolerance for governmental incompetence and neglect. Taking people's minds off what has just happened might not be very easy, and something really exceptional could be required.

Fret not, America. Lalit Modi has got just what the doctor ordered. The postponed Champion's League Twenty20 will be held soon.

The Show Will Go On

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As the American election season draws to a close, the world will be looking towards January 20th, 2009, when George Dubya Bush's successor takes office. Depending on which side you tilt towards, that will be either John McBush III or Barack Saddam Hussein Obama bin Laden.

[Interestingly, the only words Firefox thinks are wrong in the last sentence are "Barack" and "Obama"; I'm getting little red dotted underlines at those words. Looks like that's telling something about Mozilla's political leanings]

January 20th, will obviously also be the day "W" would finally cease being the leader of the free world and beacon of democracy. Unlike most of the world, I was inclined to see this as a not-so-good thing.

Now lest I be mistaken for those affectionately labeled as wingnuts or chickenhawks, I am not a fan of the Bush administration. Far from it. In the last eight years, Bush has come to symbolize incompetence in a leader. But another thing he has come to mean to the world is a repository of a lot of relatively unknown knowledge. From revealing the shocking fact that North Koreans are carrying out kidnappings in the White House (scroll right to the bottom) to expressing his ability to collaborate and also kick ass in a deeply Freudian manner as,

I can press when there needs to be pressed; I can hold hands when there needs to be -- hold hands.

to of course, his most famous revelation about the WMDs in the Eye Rack, George W Bush has been an important point for information dissemination. Through these eight years, George W Bush has pushed the bounds of reality in a way those godless scientists at the Large Hadron Collider (another suspiciously Freudian name) never could. He has boldly gone where no explorer of truth has gone before.

And so, his departure, I believed, would also have meant we would not be having an important source of factoids. I actually felt that in a handful of months the world would come to miss this genial Texas cowboy, having discovered that neither Obama nor McCain were halfway as informative as W. Who, I thought, would have the immense talent to replace the tremendous void that W would leave behind?

Mea culpa; I confess - I underestimated the power of the American nation, its limitless pool of talent, a pool that would ensure that we would never notice the loss of Bush. As darkness fell on the world as Bush's exit drew closer, a faint light shone in a less famous corner of America. A light, from the far reaches of Alaska, to give us a sign that all hope is not lost.

Sarah Palin.

When John "Bomb Iran" McCain announced the little-known Alaska Governor as his Vice Presidential candidate, many reasoned that it was a cynical ploy by the Arizona senator to get the bitter Hillary supporters and feminists on his side. Never mind the fact that he voted against equal pay for men and women, the fact that he had a woman as running mate would rally the Clinton people to him. While the jury is still out on whether that succeeded, I don't quite believe that was McCain's intention.

[Oh, and by the way, those who don't know how to pronounce Palin, it rhymes with "failin'"]

It could also have been to rally the Christian evangelist crowd, which were rather disappointed with McCain, and the choice of a anti-choice Creationist would win over the god botherers. But recent events have led me to believe that McCain is primarily looking to attract different section of the population - those who believe Bush did a "helluva job". And it is a sizable section indeed - 19% of Americans believe W did a good job. In a close election like this, 19% can make a "helluva" difference.

Palin has done the impossible - she has become as good a disseminator of information as W, if not better. For instance her famous assurance to the American people that her foreign policy credentials are strong because, she "can see Russia from my house". There have been uncharitable sarcastic comments in response such as "I can see stars from my house, so I'm an astronaut." What these sexists don't understand is that seeing stars from your house makes you an astronaut only if you put lipstick on a telescope and look through it.

Another example of Palin's aggressive ignorance would be her lack of knowledge of the Bush doctrine. Most would find it odd that the more popular person on the Republican ticket would have no idea what the Bush doctrine is, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Not allowing knowledge or the facts to distract him is one of the rare qualities that made Bush successful. Who knows, it may turn out to be a bonus for Palin too.

But what makes her truly extraordinary and puts her in the august company of GW Bush and Pratibha "I see ghosts" Patil, is her stance on Russia. When she declared that a war with Russia over the Georgia issue was a real possibility, many were horrified that Palin would speak so bluntly when she's not even elected, that too about a war with a nuclear weapons state. Sexism once again. What Sarah Palin's detractors don't realise is that while Russia is visible from her house, the Russian nukes are not. Easy mistake for a Russia watcher to make.

And then, in a very recent interview she dropped the bombshell (figuratively; she won't be literally dropping any bombshells before Jan 20th) that Putin is rearing his head and entering US airspace in Alaska.

There are reports that Putin, watching the interview choked on his vodka as he realised that he had been entering US airspace without even knowing it. Or maybe it had been his evil twin Sergei.

Palin has been in (inter)national limelight for around a month, yet the number of gaffes she's made and the valuable information she's spread is enough to encourage anyone but the jaded cynic that she would make a more than worthy successor to W as the world's Informer-in-Chief.

Come November 4, the election day, Americans will take the call on whether the Palin-McCain ticket will ascend to the White House on Jan 20th. So we come to the most important question: will Palin-McCain win? I'd say it's likely. The polls are quite close. Common sense, and what we call "anti-incumbency" would normally be enough to ensure that the party of Bush wouldn't have a icicle's hope in this election. But as Mark Twain said, no one ever went broke betting on the stupidity of the American electorate. The fatal mistake made by AIG, Lehman Bros etc was that they betted on the subprime market rather than the stupidity of their nation's electorate.

So keep your fingers crossed - McCain could still win this elections, bringing Sarah Dubya Palin a heartbeat away from the Presidency. The Bush show could very well go on.

[Image credits for the Putin photo: Boing Boing]

Imperial India

"Madness is like gravity, all it takes is a little push"

- Joker, in the movie The Dark Knight

Indeed, all it's taken for madness to be unleashed in J&K was nothing more than a little push. The act of giving 40 hectares of land for temporary use was going to cause demographic change. Jammu protested, and then Kashmiris tried to go to Muzaffarabad to sell their wares.

And in all this, bleeding hearts have come out of the woodwork arguing for "azadi". Swaminathan S Anklesaria Aiyar is one of these bleeding hearts who believes that India is doing to Kashmir what "Great" Britain did to India.

Indian "intellectuals" have got to be the most masochistic people on the planet. They hardly lose any opportunity to indulge in self-flagellation. Unfortunately, many Indians do not know the facts of the Kashmir issue, and Aiyar being a "respected" Sunday columnist, is being taken seriously by people. Let's have a look at his claims.

As a liberal, i dislike ruling people against their will.

There are a lot of people who do not wish be ruled by the govt of India. I too am one of them. I don't see why I should pay taxes for money that ends up being exchanged to buy votes in a confidence motion. And a lot of other people would agree. If we get together, can we ask for independence from India as well?

The politically correct story of the maharaja's accession ignores a devastating parallel event. Just as Kashmir had a Hindu maharaja ruling over a Muslim majority, Junagadh had a Muslim nawab ruling over a Hindu majority. The Hindu maharaja acceded to India, and the Muslim nawab to Pakistan.

Well, Aiyar too ignores a very potent fact about both Junagadh and Kashmir. It is true that the Nawab of Junagadh chose Pakistan. However, two states under his suzeraintity, Mangrol and Babariawad, acceeded to India. Junagadh attacked them, thereby attacking India. India had all the right in the world to intervene. Even after that, India agreed to a plebiscite which was almost unanimously in favor of accession to India.

Coming to Kashmir, India was not against a plebiscite. It is a common propaganda by Pakistan and the liberals that we were. But a plebiscite has pre-requisites, like everything else. The pre-requisites were specified in UN Security Council Resoution 47 [full text here] and and the very first was that Pakistan would withdraw its military from all of J&K, and the Pathan tribesmen (who had invaded Kashmir to begin with and caused Hari Singh's accession to India) and remove all non-Kashmiris from J&K.

Pakistan neither did nor committed to, any of these. So when the UN-prescribed conditions for a plebiscite have not been met, how is it hypocritical to not go for a plebiscite?

Even India's entry into Kashmir wasn't a forced one, unlike the British entry into India. India did not invade a sovereign territory, the forces moved in after Hari Singh acceeded to India. The Pathans invaded Kashmir on 22 Oct 1947 and were well on their way to Srinagar. Hari Singh asked the Indian govt to intervene. But India could not legally do so unless Kashmir acceeded to India. He did that, and that's when India came in.

UN Resolution 47 clearly clubbed the Pakistan and the Pathan "tribesmen" recognizing that Pakistan was behind the Pathan invaders. So the accession of Kashmir to India was due to the invasion precipitated by Pakistan. How is this in any way similar to what the British did?

In these 60 years, we've had that bugbear of the Right called Article 370, which among other things forbids non-Kashmiris from buying land there. The vice versa is not forbidden. This is in direct contradiction to every occupied territory in history, whether it's Tibet, British India or, indeed, "Azad" Kashmir. Occupying powers, like China in Tibet, try to change demographics, which is something India hasn't done. How is this reminiscent to British rule except in deluded fantasy?

Let me not exaggerate. Indian rule in Kashmir is not classical colonialism. India has pumped vast sums into Kashmir, not extracted revenue as the Raj did. Kashmir was among the poorest states during the Raj, but now has the lowest poverty rate in India. It enjoys wide civil rights that the Raj never gave. Some elections — 1977, 1983 and 2002 — were perfectly fair.

Well, at least at the end of an article consisting of nothing but hideous exaggeration and self-flagellation, Aiyar has the good sense to inject some perspective. Yet masochistic tendencies can't be resisted for long, evidently. That's why Indian rule is not "classical" colonialism, whatever that means.

In the end, he roots for that eternal chimera: plebiscite. A plebiscite was possible in 1948, and if Pakistan had played along things would probably have been different. But plebiscite is not an indefinitely valid promise - after generations have passed, after Pakistan has altered the demographics of PoK, after the Kashmiri Pandits have been hounded out and Aksai Chin gifted to China, there is no more plebiscite possible.

Yet, the Aiyars of the world continue to mislead people into self-flagellation. Talking about the British Raj is an emotional ploy guaranteed to succeed in sending most Indians into a catharsis of shame, and it works because most Indians haven't read Resolution 47. We're lucky intellectuals like these weren't in power during Bhindranwale's revolt, else Punjab would have been a different country by now.

The Cult of Self-Pity

In the wake of the Amarnath agitation, a lot of people have raised supposedly poignant questions about India's democracy and commitment to secularism. Many of them belong to the Arundhati Roy category of leftist "intellectuals" who have a soft corner for anything Pakistani.

So it comes as a surprise (at least to me) when Shabana Azmi joins the brigade blasting Indian secularism in this interview with Karan Thapar. [Full interview here]

Now I'm not a great fan of secularism as practiced in India, but no matter how screwed-up it is, I don't see how it is against Muslims.

Credit where it is due. Azmi is without doubt the most intelligent and sensible Muslim voice in the media. I'd say Azmi is a far better Indian than all the gung-ho media patriots to whom Indian-ness is synonymous with saffron. She's not a puppet of the Mullahs. But the favorite hobby of the Mullahs - self-pity - isn't something she's entirely immune to.

It is her view, that Indian Muslims aren't treated well because - hold your breath,

I can’t get a house in Mumbai. I wanted to buy a flat and it wasn’t given to me because I am a Muslim.

Now that's interesting, because she apparently owns four houses in Juhu and a house in Khandala. She was rejected one flat somewhere and she concluded it was because she was Muslim? What about the other four houses she bought - why hasn't she mentioned them, is it because it's not ideologically convenient to do so?

[Times of India carried out a survey to verify Azmi's claims and this is what they found]

But let's get beyond whether Azmi's claims are true or not and look at whether they would be valid even if true, because even the Sachar report mentions that Muslims don't easily get flats on rent. There are many perfectly valid reasons why flats are denied. I have rented a flat; I know.

My ex-landlord rented us the flat on condition that we wouldn't cook or eat non-veg in the house. That being the case, it is easily imaginable that he would deny anyone who he knew would have to eat non-veg at home. Even many house owners who don't mind non-veg would mind beef, and therefore deny the house. Such people have no real problem with the tenants being Muslim as they do with the fact that it means beef might be eaten in the house.

Such concerns are not unjustified. It's the landlord who owns the house and it is his choice of parameters that should prevail. He's not committing a crime by denying the house. If tomorrow a Muslim denies me a house because I enjoy mocking Mohammad and Allah, it would be entirely justified. And bear in mind, those who say idol-worship is a sin and idols are false gods are doing the very same to the Hindus - another valid reason for denying a house.

But this house comment was probably the weakest link in her interview, and picking on it isn't really nice. So let's move on to another gem from the interview.

Karan Thapar: Shabana Azmi, I want to ask you a critical question as a former MP. Let’s talk a little bit more focussed about Indian Muslims. They are amongst the poorest, least educated and worst represented communities in India. Has Indian politics been unfair to the Indian Muslim?

Shabana Azmi: (After a thoughtful pause) Yes.

This is where things get really murky. Azmi believes Indian politics has been unfair to the Indian Muslim. I really wonder where that comes from. Which Indian politician or party is actually against Muslims getting an education or getting jobs? Forget the INC and Left, even the BJP doesn't oppose it - all they oppose is reservations.

Muslim bodies do not want a Uniform Civil Code, and so it has become a touchstone of Indian secularism that UCC is not secular. The whole definition of secularism has been twisted by the politicians and the media to suit the Muslims. This doesn't seem to be unfair to the Muslims.

Salman Rushdie's book was banned in India because it "hurt Muslim sentiments." Taslima Nasrin was disgraced and not-so-subtly forced to leave the country by the government. (Interestingly, MF Husain's paintings weren't banned). I don't support the shutting up of Rushdie, Nasrin or MFH, but its too glaring that Rushdie and Nasrin were both hounded out by the govt to please Muslims while MFH was not, and again that is not unfair to Muslims either.

In Shah Bano's case Rajiv Gandhi got the law changed to please Muslims, and again that is not unfair Muslims either.

And in the most recent Amarnath controversy, we had 40 hectares of land denied for temporary structures because a demographic change would take place there. I leave you to figure out what the demographic change is, but it doesn't seem to be unfair to Muslims either. But when the VHP talks of demographic change elsewhere in India, our secular intelligentsia and media are quick to pounce upon them.

So where and how exactly is politics being unfair to Muslims? All these indicate simply that what Muslims demand, the govt does. The last thing you can cry about this is that it is being "unfair".

The only exception is Gujarat and Babri Masjid. Heinous as they are, the fact that the culprits are not brought to book is simply because you can't touch politicians of any party in India. This fact, at least, is independent of Muslims and Hindus.

Yes, it is true that Muslims are under-represented. But as the recent movie Aamir asks, who has stopped them from doing anything? Which jobs are Muslims by law unqualified to apply for?

But Azmi does hit the nail on the head finally

Karan Thapar: But they do not get it because the politician do not think of that?

Shabana Azmi: Yes, that and the fact that the community is allowing itself to listen to the fundamentalists, who are not actually their leaders.

That's the whole point. Azmi needs to ask why is it that the fundamentalists, and not people like her, are seen as the leaders. Better still, why are there any leaders on a community level at all. There are no leaders of the community for Hinduism, Sikhism or Christianity, who enjoy any amount of comparable clout. The afro-haired Sai Baba is an exception, but he has as many detractors among Hindus as followers. No one sees him as a spokesman of Hindus.

Yes, its true that Muslims need to stop seeing themselves, and the whole world, through the religious prism. There is no worldwide conspiracy against Muslims. People are too busy getting their work done and making money to have an agenda of exterminating Muslims. Even Narendra Modi, after the 2002 riots, has focussed more on development than religion, because he realises that religious hatred won't keep him in power forever.

George Bush, Narendra Modi, LK Advani and Ali Sina are not the biggest enemies of Muslims. Self-pity is.