Two years on

Exactly two years ago, almost to the hour, I was downstairs in our basement, doing my usual combination of watching TV while tweeting/blogging/Facebooking. The parents were in their room, watching TV. Suddenly, the mother called; NDTV was saying shoot-outs were happening in South Bombay. No one knew exactly what was happening; it seemed like some gang war had broken out.

I called my friend who lived in Powai at the time to ask where he was; he was home, but told me to keep him updated since he didn't own a TV. The brother, in faraway Boston, tended to get worried when attacks happen here, especially since mum and I had almost got caught in the GK blast just two months prior, so I shot off this mail to him:

shootouts happening all over south bombay... not too sure at this point if it's a gang war or terror attack. cafe leopold, taj hotel, oberoi hotel, vt station. find out if your friends are ok.

I wasn't very big on punctuation back then.

By midnight, we knew it was a terrorist attack, but it hadn't yet struck home just how bad the situation was. I put up this utterly frivolous post which I have never yet forgiven myself for, shut down my computer, and settled down to watch TV. And for the next two hours, watched in increasing horror as Bombay burned.

26 November 2008. It's one of those dates when practically everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when the news came in.

2008 as a year was bad for India. There were attacks happening every few months, if not weeks. Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Delhi - all these cities got hit one after the other that year. And this is what we heard about. Back then the Naxal situation wasn't even getting the media attention it has got over the past year or so; no one was even bothered about Kashmir.

But Bombay caught everyone's attention. The sheer audacity, the targets, the execution, and the way it went on for nearly 60 hours - quite literally, the world watched as Bombay burned.

Everyone knows someone who was affected - directly or indirectly. Even after it was over, emotions ran high for weeks, with India wanting action. Heads had to roll, and India didn't care whose heads rolled. Kasab got the fastest trial and verdict ever, and is now sitting in jail, awaiting the day his sentence is finally carried out.

But a post by Dilip D'Souza asks a very pertinent question: why this and not others? There's a lady he has quoted in his article which hit me.

“If we have a remembrance for one,” she said, “I want it for all. I want it for everyone who dies like this. Otherwise we wonder, what did our sons die for?”

Two days ago, on the roads of Delhi, I saw a piece of graffiti saying 'Justice for 26/11 victims. What about victims of 1984 riots?' As I tweeted when I saw that, it's never going to be enough in this country. There will always something else that'll come to mind and make you feel the despair.

1984, 1992, 1993, 2002. Events that make me cringe when I think of them. Events where justice hasn't happened even today.

I'm not trying to take away from the trauma of 2008. It was a terrible time - I personally know someone who was in Singapore at the time, and whose mother was in Hong Kong. And whose father spent the night hiding in a restaurant in Colaba. And he couldn't tell his mother this, because she was in hospital with her daughter, who gave birth to her first child that night. Can you imagine what this guy was going through? Knowing that he may just lose his father the same night he gets a nephew?

But see, that's the thing. This time, we were hit, so to speak. We knew people who were impacted. It wasn't faceless, nameless Indians dying in some corner of another city. It was people who have access to twitter, to blogs, to freaking candles.

Why don't we ask for the same kind of justice for other victims? Why don't we speak out for any other tragedy?

This is a very hypocritical post. Apart from sharing a whole bunch of links on twitter, what have I ever done, after all?

I don't even know the point of this post. It's more rambling catharsis than anything else.

It's just... the bleakness of it all is very frustrating at times. Isn't it?

The aftermath

It's almost exactly a week, to the hour, since it all began. Since India saw the beginnings of what would turn into 60 hours of unending horror.

I was in a conference in Chennai all of Friday and Saturday, and had told my father and my friend to keep updating me. All my friend would keep saying in her SMS' all through Friday was "It's still not over." Saturday morning I was about to leave the hotel when I saw the Taj catch fire again on the ground floor and first floor. Half an hour later, en route to the conference, I got the news: It was over.

My brother's friend's uncle. My friend's aunt's friends. My dad's former colleague's nephew. These are not people I would have ever met. But they're impacted. Greeting people online in the past week, we haven't been saying "how're you doing?"; we've been asking, "is everyone you know alright?"

It's hard to put down thoughts about all that has happened. I could talk about how anguished I am at all the deaths and the injuries. I could talk about how awed I am at the courage displayed by the hotel staff of the three hotels, all the NSG commandos and to some extent, the journalists who were out there for three days, telling us what was happening. I could tell you how grateful I am to know my immediate near and dear ones are safe. I could tell you how weird and guilt-inducing it feels to realise that we are back to our regular lives, when for so many, life will never be the same again.

Or I could tell you how sickened I feel when I hear R R Patil quote DDLJ, or watch Naqvi talk about "paschimi poshak". How exasperated I feel when I watch the Congress and the NCP squabble over who could be the next Chief Minister of Maharashtra. How disgusted I feel when I hear about Narendra Modi offer compensation to the widow of the man he said all kinds of things about when he was alive - well, that I don't really need to; you all know I hate the man.

There are, however, three things I would like to say.

First of all, the BJP has no bloody business talking about the Congress' ineffectiveness against terror and demanding the whole government resigns. Their Prime Ministerial candidate, L K Advani, was Home Minister when the IC 814 hijacking took place; he didn't resign when his Foreign Minister escorted those terrorists to the border. He didn't resign when Parliament was attacked; he didn't resign when hundreds of Muslims were killed in Gujarat. So, no, I'm not particularly impressed with the Congress, but the BJP has no right to say anything.

Secondly, there's been a lot of comment all round on the role of the media in this entire incident. I am impressed with the courage they have shown, and if not for them, we would have had no idea about what was happening. I watched only three channels all through the events - NDTV 24x7, CNN IBN, and Times Now. Of the three, I thought NDTV was the sanest, Barkha Dutt's increasing stupidity notwithstanding. I could have whacked all the channels on the head for showing minute details of the rescue operations while the operations were on, but that's 24-hour news channels for you. They don't think terrorists with satellite phones have access to cable television.

What is annoying me, however, is the way they're carrying on after the attack is over. By carrying on and on about how ineffective our government is, they're pretty much telling the whole world the state of our country, and scaring the people of the country even more. So the terrorists might be dead, but you're just adding to the success of their mission, aren't you?

And finally, this entire campaign that the citizens of India have begun. Candle light marches, rallies in all the metros, and a strong desire to make our authorities understand what we need.

Here's my question: why has this come about? Because the "elite" of the country were hit. You can talk all you want about wanting a better India; the only reason this is happening is because the moneyed people have woken up to the fact that they are vulnerable as well.

The TV channels were up in arms talking about injustice to Jessica Lall when Manu Sharma got acquitted; other than Tehelka, name one newspaper, magazine, or channel which even mentioned the Dalit killings in Maharashtra? Plenty of soldiers die everyday in J&K and in the North East; which politician goes to visit their homes?

For three days, we saw cameras focused constantly on the Taj, the Oberoi, the Trident, and Nariman House. Can someone tell me the sequence of events VT station? How many people died there? What really happened at Cama Hospital? I don't know. Because amidst all the media reports, the blog entries, everything, these events are barely mentioned.

I can understand the focus being on the Taj. The people trapped inside for 58 hours, the commandos who went in and battled it out - they all have my utmost sympathies. But don't forget the aam aadmi in the concern for the rich.

If this campaign by the citizens lasts, I'll be extremely happy. If it achieves some good, I'm all for it. But please, be honest about why this has happened.

And on a lighter note, here's Jon Stewart for you:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Mumbai Tragedy

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

The horror continues

After my post of midnight, I was up till 1.30 AM last night, watching with increasing horror at the situation in Mumbai. For the first time since I left college I think, i was up before 6.30 AM, to see the latest updates, only to realise that, far from being better, things were the same, if not worse. I did absolutely nothing productive at work today, spending most of my time tracking things on Twitter. This is by far the most horrifying thing to happen to India in my living memory, although the parents may counter that.

I am also feeling extremely guilty about the way I spoke of the Taj and the incident in my last post; considering the gravity and the widespread nature of incidents across our "commercial capital", it was completely unjustifiable.

There are people who have been inside their hotel rooms, unable to leave, for more than 20 hours now. Luckily, in this modern age of technology, almost all of them have mobile phones and are in touch with their near and dear ones. But does that lessen their trauma in any way?

Amidst all the reactions in the blogosphere, the most evocative first-hand accounts come from two of my favourite bloggers, who happened to be together at the time - Amit Varma and Sonia Faleiro. Another first-hand account which I heard on the news this morning was from a guy named Deepak, who was/is a guest in the Taj. He talked of how the hotel staff had kept him and his neighbour updated through the night, how he could see the terrorists from his room window, and how he was staying calm by reading the Hanuman Chalisa. Does it ever strike you as strange, how religion can calm and destroy at the very same moment?

I'm so very scared for the future of my country.

And again

My one and only visit to Mumbai was in May this year. It was soon after the Jaipur blasts, if I remember correctly, and we happened to go to both the Taj and the J W Marriott. The latter had actually beefed up security to the extent that my purse was put through one of those screening machines - the kind you see at the airport.

The day of the second Delhi blast in October - the one which happened exactly a week after the GK ones - I was in Connaught Place. A friend called from Mumbai to find out if I'm fine and mentioned that he's actually made groups in his phone's contact list - one for each metro city of the country. Makes it easier for him to react and find out about family and friends every time a blast happens.

I'm beginning to realise he has a point.

Back in May, the Taj had no security to speak of. What're you betting that'll change for the next six months at least?

This is sickening.