Satya Pal Malik’s recent statement on the Pulwama attack has turned the tables in a real sense. Intentionally or unintentionally, former Occupied Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik has simply defended Pakistan’s stance on the Pulwama attack of February 2019. In a recent interview this former member of the Narendra Modi-led government, alleged that the Indian Prime Minister silenced him on the security lapses which led to the 2019 Pulwama attack. According to him, Modi played a dirty game by concealing the truth from his own nation and tried to fix and frame Pakistan in a matter which actually had nothing to do with it.
Whatever happened in Pulwama was the action of some indigenous groups already active in India; however the negligence and non-professional attitude of the Indian security organizations provided these groups a strong support. Satya Pal Malik has also pointed towards the same incompetence and carelessness of the Indian security organizations in his recent interview. It is also on record that the Modi government expressed no surprise after the Pulwama incident though it was no doubt a tragedy which claimed lives of more than 40 CRPF personnel and left five critically injured. Instead of lamenting the killing of those ‘sons of the oil’ and instead of taking to task those responsible for this mishap, the Modi government started playing the old dirty game of blaming Pakistan simply as a routine practice.
A more painful fact revealed by Satya Pal Malik is that Modi had asked him to ‘stay quiet’ about the security lapses he allegedly raised with the government. According to Satya Pal Malik, India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval had also advised him to keep silent over the alleged lapses. Malik said that he was well aware of the fact that all the onus of the attack would be “put on Pakistan” to reap electoral benefits. Actually, by misrepresenting the facts, Modi tried to kill two birds with one stone; on one hand he attempted to defame Pakistan and on the other hand he tried to nurture the anti-Muslim feelings among the extremist section of the Indian society. For the last many years it has been Mr. Modi’s routine practice to follow and promote the Hindutva philosophy which directs its followers to adopt a strategy resulting in the conversion of a constitutionally secular India into an ethnic Hindu state. Mr. Modi, being a staunch follower of that philosophy, plans and struggles to push all minorities to a second-class status in India, including the Muslims who are more than 200 million in number.
Frontline concluded its analysis by saying that ‘the election returns proved that the BJP’s muscular nationalism campaign was the predominant, if not the only, factor that facilitated Modi’s landslide victory’. India is not just a vast piece of land; it is the name of a centuries’ old culture, civilization and traditions. India has ever been a home to countless artists and artisans who created eternal types of masterpieces in the fields of poetry, singing and architecture, among others. Secularism has been the real beauty of India. Anyone who tries to deprive that country of its original and genuine colour of secularism could never be its well-wisher. For the sake of personal gains and subjective motives, no one must be given a free hand to deface the serenity of the Land of Art and Culture.
A very important fact regarding the Pulwama attack is that some sections of the Indian media started raising hue and cry, without any confirmation, against Pakistan just after the incident. The noise they made was not for those soldiers whose lives were wasted in that incident; it was only against Pakistan. It seemed that on Modi’s direction, they had already tailored the desired or required propaganda material. It is something very positive on the part of some Indian media houses that they tried their utmost to bring the truth to the public even at that time. Though they didn’t support Pakistan, they tried to expose the negligence and inability of the Indian security organizations; The Hindu is also one such media organisaton.
In a report published on 21 February 2021, The Hindu said, “There were at least 11 intelligence inputs between January 2, 2019, and February 13, 2019, pointing to a macabre “Qisas (retribution) mission” in the making, one that culminated eventually in the attack on a security convoy in Lethpora, Pulwama. But the government was deaf to all these.” One of India’s most reliable magazines, Frontline, has something more shocking to reveal on the issue. In an investigation report on the issue, the magazine said, “In the aftermath of the attack, which took place eight weeks before the 2019 general election, there was relentless mobilization of emotion by the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party and its ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), calling for avenging the attack and projecting Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the sole protector of the national interest. Prime time television hugely aided the politicization of national security issues, more so after the aerial raid at Balakot by the Indian Air Force on February 26, when one news bulletin after the other claimed, without evidence, that at least 300 Pakistani terrorists had been eliminated in that bombing.”
Frontline concluded its analysis by saying that ‘the election returns proved that the BJP’s muscular nationalism campaign was the predominant, if not the only, factor that facilitated Modi’s landslide victory’. India is not just a vast piece of land; it is the name of a centuries’ old culture, civilization and traditions. India has ever been a home to countless artists and artisans who created eternal types of masterpieces in the fields of poetry, singing and architecture, among others. Secularism has been the real beauty of India. Anyone who tries to deprive that country of its original and genuine colour of secularism could never be its well-wisher. For the sake of personal gains and subjective motives, no one must be given a free hand to deface the serenity of the Land of Art and Culture.
