Creative Politics, Please!

It has to be fear. Fear of change, fear of being chastised, fear of looking stupid. It is rampant upon you if you are the average Indian. In a culture of negativity comes a decision to make our country a democracy, and after thousands of years of kings and hundreds under the British, it is only natural that our beloved Mother India has a character that is twisted and confused, warped and unfit, and our politicians can only reflect that.

Still, we have come a long way in sixty odd years since independence, and will go much further faster if we drop our archaic notions of what is "good" and simply focus on what "works" for us. Our domestic policy of appeasement of minorities through reservations has by and large, not worked. Our foreign policy of non-allignment worked for a while before it became meaningless, and now, our coalition government looks great as an example of a shining democracy, but that is useful only for patting ourselves on the back, and terrible when it comes to getting something done.

Our policy of keeping Kashmir in a "special status" has not worked at all, even though it can be argued that Kashmir has not been environmentally degraded by industrialization. How about degrading it with poverty? Yes Sir, we can deliver that. No wonder we have trouble there, and it just helped Pakistan infiltrate and cause mayhem of many sorts. Now, we have a military that is superior to that of Pakistan, but we do not have the mindset to wrest Kashmir out of Pakistan's grip. Neither do we want to concede and save millions of rupees fighting a war we do not want to win.

Our economic policies since Manmohan Singh came to the fore have been great. To turn our country from bankruptcy to where we are today is commendable. Here we have something that works, come as it did out of an impossibility to continue in the direction we had gone for a long time. See, we're good at rescuing ourselves from terrible dangers we cause upon ourselves!

We have been criticized for not having enough strong laws against terror. I disagree, and would go far enough to say, not many countries have much of a policy to prevent terror attacks, but have fairly good measures to safeguard a lot of places, but no country can claim to be attack proof. We have a huge coastline, lots of soft targets, a police force that cannot catch even a schoolboy on a fast sprint, and politicians that have no intention of delivering anything on any front, so it is going to take a while before we figure out how to combat terror. I'd say we're no worse at combating terror than we are at combating pollution.

What would happen if we got creative with our politics? It isn't as if we are going to sink if we got a few things wrong, since we get most things wrong anyway, and it isn't as if we'd feel shy if something worked out! So, what is stopping us from coming up with really creative ways of solving problems? A lack of ideas? That just cannot be since we Indians are full of ideas, especially after the fact. So, we need to find a way to get these ideas to the decision makers.

Let's start with terrorists. If they're looking for martyrdom, the best way to deny that to a Muslim terrorist is to bathe him (or his dead body) in pig's blood, and bury him in pieces along with a fair amount of pork all over him. If we telecast this, or send a DVD to Osama Bin Laden, the bastards who are members of LeT and other idiots fighting the so called Holy War, they can see for themselves how they are sending their young recruits into a guaranteed passage to hell. Take away the ultimate prize and they will think twice before attacking us.

We need to remove all nationalist emotion at a time like this. How dare we give terrorists the satisfaction of having attacked a nation? Do they deserve a reaction that brings out our flag? Shouldn't we reserve nationalist sentiments for much bigger causes than fighting a bunch of no good thugs with inflated notions? Who the hell is this cockroach Kasav to make us feel so strongly about our "country"? Why isn't anybody talking about this? All the emotional stuff that comes on our media plays right into the hands of terrorists that they are getting enormously bloated results. If the I and B ministry calls the heads of all the TV channels into a room and tells them point blank that if they don't stop this nationalistic shit, they will lose their broadcasting licenses, it is bound to have an effect. But then, that takes creativity and imagination. I wonder if nationalism can ever be replaced by pragmatism, that would be the beginning of light and growth, but right now, we have a bunch of clueless idiots in positions of enormous power and significance who can't see beyond some retarded idea of flag hoisting over a bunch of terror attacks.

Whoever came up with this idea of human chains? We form human chains for every rhyme and reason, and it is understandable in a time of great human grief, like the aftermath of a tsunami, but to give a bunch of extremists that kind of reaction - not my idea of putting them in their place. We should stop this nonsense and come back to "normal" in every way we can. Mumbai, I hope your resilience hasn't melted to this mushy stuff just because we as a nation poured it over you.

If Pakistan talks about "non-state actors" being responsible for terror againt India, we should quietly tell them what non-state targets we are about to bomb, and how it would really help if they could help us finding more non-state actors within Pakistan and how they can line them up near our non-state border for us to pick up and question and kill! If Pakistan drags its feet, it wouldn't hurt to drape the pork chops and pig blood in the Pakistani flag before giving the criminals a public burning on the stake.

There are five rivers that flow in Pakistan. All five originate in India. Now, that should get us thinking, for there is plenty we can do with river water. A biological agent that prevents pregnancies should do very well. One that makes people absolutely incapacitated physically will be a good one to follow up in an emergency. But then, there is the pesky issue of a River Water accord that we have signed with Pakistan, and the last time we wanted to build a dam across one of these rivers, Pakistan ran in panic to the UN to stop the project. Why this accord should hold good when Pakistan feels free to challenge the Kashmir Accession accord is beyond me, but doesn't have to be beyond our policy makers. Poisoning the waters, now that, is a trump card. Inhuman? How about the nuclear weapons both countries have?

We have to be creative in avoiding an expensive dramatic conflict with Pakistan, simply because it is unnecessary and should be more fun to see them implode instead of explode. Right now, it is one helluva clusterf@#k in that godforsaken country. If Pakistanis want to be really holy about sending their children to madarasas instead of modern schools, they should not want to go to other countries for a living. If they want to embrace a modern world and send people to play professional sport in other countries, they should make sure there is no other dimension that wants to take Pakistan to the stone age with their religious nonsense.

The country has no singular character, and we are all okay with that, but it really shouldn't involve any effort on our part, India's part, to have to deal with two Pakistans. For us, the bastards who come across the border to bomb our cities are the same as the people who go to other countries to study and later settle down there. Pakistanis are Pakistanis, and if one Pakistan wants to declare war against India, they are all our bloody enemies. Until we get this clear in our heads, we won't be winning any war. It is upto us to creatively bleed Pakistan and paint them in one colour, especially after an incident like Mumbai.

India has everything to gain by painting to the world at large that Pakistan is a rogue state, which it is. There should be no thought spared to decent Pakistanis who want a peaceful life, for it is THEIR business to rein in their extreme elements, not ours to understand how hard it is for them. India can get really clever and disturb Pakistan economically and socially, by doing a few creative things. This captured terrorist Kasav has said he was offered 1.5 lakhs to do what he did. We can offer 20 lakhs to people who can give us information about terrorists like Dawood Ibrahim. We should begin by paying the sum to a few Pakistanis! What a riot that will start! If 1.5 lakhs is enough for someone to give his life, 20 lakhs ought to settle it in our favour. Creativity is everything. If we can make people buy Rin soap instead of Nirma, we should be able to figure out how to get Pakistanis to play in our favour.

Loss of productivity is a huge loss. Every traffic jam is a loss of productivity. It isn't that hard for us to create loss of productivity in the multiple for our neighbour. After all, waving the flag of "TERROR" works in miraculous ways. Pakistan has given us all we need to raise flags of terror everywhere not quite in its favour. We can use this in very nice ways to eat away at Pakistan's economy through its lack of credibility. The fact that they are always teetering between civilian and military rule should give us great joy, not worry, like our politicians and self proclaimed experts claim. In the foreseeable future, the UN will have to "invade" Pakistan as peacekeepers, as warring factions will take over those non-state areas that the government of Pakistan doesn't control. This would take some genius within the Indian political mechanism, but since India is a big contributor to UN peacekeeping missions all over the world, it will work in India's favour massively, if the Indian Army could enter Pakistan under a UN flag. We will really get to keep the peace in the way we want, while having the sanction of the world.

Military governments are not looked upon very favourably by the world community. Pakistan is no self sustaining island of prosperity. Pakistan isn't as economically untouchable as we are. They can ill afford sanctions to be slapped upon them. India should convince, bribe, bully and cajole all international aid agencies to suspend all aid to Pakistan, get all Pakistani charities under an umbrella of suspicion, ensure that all their ships are searched extensively at all ports of call, ensure that all Pakistani citizens pass through separate highly scrutinized lines at airports, their planes are searched and treated like bombs, and do everything possible with our media machinery to put so much pressure on every Pakistani citizen till they change their ways, collectively, not individually. It is possible, but needs some creativity in our decision making processes.

There are several regions of Pakistan that the Pakistani govenment doesn't control. Waziristan for example. These won't be bad places for some of our missiles to start hitting some targets, particularly since our satellites can pick up some pretty dramatic imagery. If we can see how ripe mangoes in the Sunderbans are, we can definitely see terrorist training camps. If there are any monkeys with guns running around with beards in these areas, they are fair game. There is so much confusion in that area right now, with the militants being attacked by Pakistani army, the army being attacked by the militants, Americans shooting at the militants, Pakistani army hating the fact and wanting to thwart the American military, and the resulting confusion can only be increased in sparkle by our missiles hitting some targets. The Pakistani army doesn't dare start a war with India while they can't even fight these dope funded groups.

It is no secret that the drug trade funds the militants in this area. It is their currency. We could destroy their market by following the trail and replacing it with a supply from a South American country. Colombia, Peru and other such banana republics can produce any amount of dope and strip these mountain monkeys in Afghanistan and Pakistan from competing. If they can pump millions of rupees in counterfeit Indian currency through Nepal, we can bloody well make sure the price of heroin drops till the teeth start falling out of impoverished drug dealers. Of course this would take a great deal of awareness in theatres of action very far away from where we are, but we have ambitions of being a superpower don't we? So, why can't the fools in New Delhi come up with some New Ideas?

The biggest sham, which we should continue with, is the peace process. We should continue our bus diplomacy, train diplomacy, and even some jackass and mule diplomacy as we see fit. This is all about image and if there is one country whose image has taken a beating and is guaranteed to take a bigger hit, that is Pakistan, not India. We should overtly do everything to continue to look like the caring neighbour who sees terrorism as much of a Pakistani problem as it is India's. Yeah, sure, it is as much Pakistan's problem, but it is our problem because of Pakistan, and not Pakistan's problem because of us. Big difference. Let's use creativity to keep the squeeze on.

For example...we can also use this time of subdued belligerence by Indian Muslims and suggest strongly that we enact a uniform civil code, without which our country is doomed in any case. Offer the Muslims a straight deal - You want to accept a uniform civil code, you can do so right now, or else, accept a criminal code for Muslims that is different from others, and we can use Saudi Arabia as a shining example to copy from. That will be the last time anybody ever talks against a uniform civil code. To think as Indians, we certainly cannot paint ourselves in different shades on the basis of this nonsense called religion. Religious freedom should always take a backseat to unfairness, if the progress of India shouldn't take a backseat to archaic notions.

Now, for heavens' sake, let's get creative about getting something done without the aid of our dumb as bricks politicians. All these fools are interested in is screwing our country and making money for themselves. Let's come up with ideas to remove the incentives politicians get by winning an election. It is time our politicians are ignored and the country progressed on the initiative of our own people - yes, you and I. That would mean we do everything a little differently, a little thoughtfully, and that we spend a bit of time and energy to help fix the system where it isn't working.