As kids we read the story of a shepherd boy who was a habitual false alarm raiser. He announced the attack of the wolf on his sheep for fun, and almost lost credibility, so much so as to lose his cattle when the real attack took place. A modern event in correspondence with this legend has been the killing of Osama bin Laden. I expected just another gimmick when a Nisheeth informed me –half in jest—that he had killed bin Laden. I naturally reacted with a, “yeah right… is it another Facebook application that you’re entertaining yourself with?” but his rebuke on my ignorance led me to the television and I discovered that his news was half correct. Osama had been killed, though not by Nisheeth but by American soldiers.
I surfed all the news channels to read the BREAKING NEWS flash that it was a hoax and America had once again been tricked, but none came. By the evening Indian news channels (esp. Times Now) surfaced similar suspicions as mine about the dead man really being an Osama and not just a dummy to please Obama. The body had been quickly disposed off in the sea and no direct telecast seemed apt like it had been in the case of Saddam Hussain. And all information about the dead man’s identity and his DNA samples lie with the U.S., so we are supposed to believe them, i.e. until the ‘real’ Osama comes up with yet another video cursing and middle fingering America.
Anyway, the whole world seems to be rejoicing the fall of the Al-Qaida chief. But was killing of Osama really worth all the blood spilling around the world? Everyone knows the answer and there is no point stating the obvious. Let us stick to the lighter part of the story. Our esteemed royal man (outside the royal Gandhi family, of course) Digvijay Singh pugnaciously condemned the way Osama was thrown into the brine. He is of the opinion that even the fiercest of the terrorists deserve a decent last ceremony; an Islamic burial. Had only America declared its intentions before quickly committing the blasphemy (of giving Osama a Jal Samadhi and not killing him, for the latter is a complete no-no in the Indian political context; we would have rather begged Pakistan to give Osama to us and let him spend the rest of his life in our prestigious jails), I assume Digvijay would have volunteered to accept Osama’s body and give him the truly deserved Islamic burial on our soil, somewhere in U.P. where there’s a need for serious Congress (re)fixation. This was the least he could do as the General Secretary of an All India Congress Committee that is chronically embarrassed by the man’s radical illustrations of experienced-in-naivety vocabulary.
The purpose that Osama’s killing really serves is a political maelstrom in Pakistan (sometimes I really feel sad for our clinically removed pustule that opted for the vish in the churning of the Indian Ocean in the name of partition). It brought a bucketful of good news for India. First of all, it gave the Indian media some masala to cover in the lull after the Lokpal bill controversy. Columnists, who were beginning to work on their autobiographies in all the spare time, got the required nudging to beat the dust off their decade old diaries and books for interesting facts about Al-Qaida, world terrorism et al. The political leaders of the Opposition parties received go-aheads to pester the government to do things that obviously even they wouldn’t do if in power—talking about terrorism with Pakistan in just the right tone.
As far as seemingly direct implications are concerned, I don’t think the killing of Osama (even if it’s true) makes any difference other than a symbolic one. I don’t expect the Al-Qaida to have sat idle all this while and nursed their leader for gout and hernia and all the ailments that pundits claimed he was suffering from. With or without him they are more alive than before.
I surfed all the news channels to read the BREAKING NEWS flash that it was a hoax and America had once again been tricked, but none came. By the evening Indian news channels (esp. Times Now) surfaced similar suspicions as mine about the dead man really being an Osama and not just a dummy to please Obama. The body had been quickly disposed off in the sea and no direct telecast seemed apt like it had been in the case of Saddam Hussain. And all information about the dead man’s identity and his DNA samples lie with the U.S., so we are supposed to believe them, i.e. until the ‘real’ Osama comes up with yet another video cursing and middle fingering America.
Anyway, the whole world seems to be rejoicing the fall of the Al-Qaida chief. But was killing of Osama really worth all the blood spilling around the world? Everyone knows the answer and there is no point stating the obvious. Let us stick to the lighter part of the story. Our esteemed royal man (outside the royal Gandhi family, of course) Digvijay Singh pugnaciously condemned the way Osama was thrown into the brine. He is of the opinion that even the fiercest of the terrorists deserve a decent last ceremony; an Islamic burial. Had only America declared its intentions before quickly committing the blasphemy (of giving Osama a Jal Samadhi and not killing him, for the latter is a complete no-no in the Indian political context; we would have rather begged Pakistan to give Osama to us and let him spend the rest of his life in our prestigious jails), I assume Digvijay would have volunteered to accept Osama’s body and give him the truly deserved Islamic burial on our soil, somewhere in U.P. where there’s a need for serious Congress (re)fixation. This was the least he could do as the General Secretary of an All India Congress Committee that is chronically embarrassed by the man’s radical illustrations of experienced-in-naivety vocabulary.
The purpose that Osama’s killing really serves is a political maelstrom in Pakistan (sometimes I really feel sad for our clinically removed pustule that opted for the vish in the churning of the Indian Ocean in the name of partition). It brought a bucketful of good news for India. First of all, it gave the Indian media some masala to cover in the lull after the Lokpal bill controversy. Columnists, who were beginning to work on their autobiographies in all the spare time, got the required nudging to beat the dust off their decade old diaries and books for interesting facts about Al-Qaida, world terrorism et al. The political leaders of the Opposition parties received go-aheads to pester the government to do things that obviously even they wouldn’t do if in power—talking about terrorism with Pakistan in just the right tone.
As far as seemingly direct implications are concerned, I don’t think the killing of Osama (even if it’s true) makes any difference other than a symbolic one. I don’t expect the Al-Qaida to have sat idle all this while and nursed their leader for gout and hernia and all the ailments that pundits claimed he was suffering from. With or without him they are more alive than before.
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