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A tale of two liars BJP is damned      by perception Will destroying the      Bamiyan Buddha      recreate Babri Masjid Sonia and her advisors      have learnt nothing      from history Of Kashmir, nationalism      and rights

Of restraint and cowardice

The way India has dealt with the Bangladeshi intrusion is thoroughly disgusting. It is clear that even after Kargil and the IC-814 hijack, this government simply has learnt nothing. Worse, this government, the first on bombast and jingoism, has shown its complete inability to stand up to bullying of the worst kind.

Let us take this nonsense about "exercising restraint." Of course, we must "exercise restraint." If that means not declaring war on Bangladesh, certainly! But restraint does not mean letting those guilty of the cold-blooded murder of Indian jawans go scot-free.

And it is here that there is a problem. The problem is that the Indian government is seeking to mollycoddle the Sheikh Hasina government because she is a "friend."

In the Kargil war, the same story did the round. Nawaz Sharief is a friend, and hence the people guilty of attacking and holding our territory is the Pakistani army. Hence our action must not be against Sharief but only against the Pakistani army.

What happened then was that we threw out the Pakistani army along with the infiltrators and Mujahideen, but who paid for the cost of about 500 Indian lives, not to even mention the money and other expenses. Are Indian jawans so cheap that not one Pakistani was punished in one small measure for the incursion in Kargil?

No doubt, Indian troops killed Pakistanis in the war (the exact number will never be known, and whether we killed more than we lost is still unclear, despite our military's claims to that effect), but that killing was only to regain our territory.

And finally, in trying to mollycoddle good old Nawaz, we soon found Sharief out of power and shortly thereafter, out of the country. So much for our efforts!

Now, we have another similar scenario where some Bangladeshi soldiers capture and kill our soldiers in cold blood. Our baritone minister of external affairs and defence says that "criminal adventurism" is responsible for the killings. The minister is no doubt good in the use of the English language, pity he isn't so effective in his ministries.

Our foreign affairs mandarins prefer Sheikh Hasina as prime minister of Bangladesh than anyone else. But why should New Delhi intervene in the affairs of Dhaka? Whom Bangladeshis seek to elect is their prerogative, why should we bother? Instead, let us clearly bother with what the Bangladesh Rifles is doing on our borders, irrespective of who is in power in Dhaka.

Hasina being in power means little to the families of the killed jawans and to India. In fact, if Khaleda Zia can keep a check on the BDR, she's much better off being in power from India's perspective.

The fact is that India's response has been pathetic. Jaswant Singh angrily retorted in Parliament, "What do you want us to do? Bomb Bangladesh?"

No, we don't (just as many of us insisted that there was no need for India to declare an all-out war against Pakistan in the Kargil crisis, unless the situation worsened). No one wants a war with Bangladesh. No one even expects it, save the most radical ones and idiots.

But everyone wants that the guilty be punished, right up to the highest levels, for their crime of killing Indian jawans. We want justice and we want to see it happen. No one wants India declare war on Bangladesh, but no one wants that for the sake of friendly neighbours, the guilty should go unpunished. Because restraint is not tantamount to letting your enemies (or friends, for that matter) walk all over you. Restraint is based on mutual respect, mutual regard, and courage of conviction.

But sadly, I, at least don't expect anything to happen.

Because in India, we are proving once more, that some lives are cheaper than others. Poor jawans, hailing from lower income families, don't count for much. In the name of diplomacy, we'll keep quiet (please note how J N Dixit hailed the way New Delhi handled the issue) and the case will once more be forgotten (like all the other times when the poor have been killed or murdered, whether by fellow Indians or others).

Of course, if even one officer in the Indian high commission in Dhaka had been killed and his body carted around on a pole, you can be sure that there would have been bedlam all around. Our political leaders, our diplomatic and bureaucratic babus would have bellowed blue murder and the government would have acted much more firmly, demanding and getting the culprits to pay. Simply for the reason that in India's perverted wisdom such an officer matters more than mere jawans.

The BJP has always talked big about making India a great power (I always thought we were!). Now it is time to act and ensure that justice is served.

Amberish K Diwanji