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Showing posts from November, 2008

India's National Humiliation - By Arvind Lavkare

•Hang your heads in shame, my India countrymen. Do it because a dozen-odd terrorists traveled 500 nautical miles of the Arabian sea from Karachi to Mumbai’s Gateway of India and proceeded to humble the city of 16.4 million into utter helplessness for over 48 hours even as over 150 civilians and some distinguished professional security men lost their lives to the hand grenades and rifle bullets of a fanatical mindset. It was a humiliation worse than the drubbing the Chinese army gave us in 1961. •It was because our motherland, India is a soft nation, tested and proven so several times. Ahimsa, non-violence, became the motto of our motherland. So bad has this become over the last 60 years that today even killing a stray dog on the street, however vicious and sick, has become a crime, courtesy another Gandhi, Maneka by name. •At every stage of our every “encounter” with a terrorist act, our collective national response has been reactive rather than active, defensive rather than offensive

Porous Security

I have just returned after business trip to Colombo, Mumbai, Karachi and New Delhi. All these four cities have taken the brunt of some of the brutal terrorist attacks on innocent civilians. As I traveled to all these cities, security was omnipresent. But with the exception of Karachi Airport - I found all the places have large security gaps. At Karachi Marriott and also with other Marriott hotels, there is a sniffer dog that goes around the car. Security asks driver to open the bonnet of the car and also use mirror to check the underneath of the car. But its funny. They never ask passengers to open the bags or check the contents. Perhaps - they believe the metal detector and frisking at the main gate would serve the purpose. But car can still be parked with unwanted contents inside the car. It was the similar Case at Kandy. Dalada Maligava (temple complex where the tooth of Buddha is housed) is one of vulnerable target of LTTE. Car parking security is tough but as porous as any Mar