Friends, my apologies for writing the second article of this series after such a long time!
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This article has been inspired from a dialogue from the Marathi serial Raja ShivChhatrapati on Star Pravaah.
THE SITUATION
Shivaji Maharaj is trying to bring the densely forested and strategically important Jawali valley under his control while the current ruler of Jawali, Chandrarao More not only refuses but also insults Shivaji’s ambassador to the court of Chandrarao More. Enraged at the arrogance shown by More, Shivaji Maharaj decides to take Jawali by force and this is when this dialogue is uttered in the serial and the subject is Chandrarao More. It goes like this:
आले, तर त्यांच्या सोबत!
नाही आले, तर त्यांच्या शिवाय!
आणि आडवे आले, तर त्यांच्या छाताडावर पाय देऊन!
पण स्वराज्याचा भगवा हा फडकलाच पाहिजे!!
Literal Translation:
If he (Chandrarao More) decides to cooperate, then we will progress with him!
If he does not want to come with us, then we will progress without him!
If he tries to put hurdles in our path, then we will trample him and then progress!
But the Flag (Bhagwa) of Swarajya shall fly high, come what may!!
The contrast between the meaning of this dialogue and the present state of affairs in India is what struck me. India is a soft state. Any small country, terrorist organization can get up tomorrow, slap India and still escape unscathed.
Why?
Is it because India is not aggressive enough? Are we scared of our neighbors? Are we scared of terrorists? Is it because we do not have the capabilities to respond in kind to them?
I do not think so.
It is because of our great attitude of forgiving and worse, forgetting.
SOME EXAMPLES FROM THE PRESENT
Let us talk examples.
Remember IC 814? Remember it being hijacked?
Do you remember why it went to Kandahar?
Only because the delay in taking a strong decision on using NSG Commandos to neutralize the hijackers and rescuing the hostages! Only because the Punjab Police who were ready to immobilize the aircraft at Amritsar did not recieve the approval from New Delhi!
Remember the attack on the Indian parliament in 2001?
What did we do in response to the attack?
Operation Parakram? That build up of forces on both sides of the border?
It gained nothing for India…Only outcome was that we lost more than 300 soldiers in various incidents including accidents, shelling and firing.
And on top of that, the killer Afzal Guru has his pardon pending at the President of India’s office. That same Afzal Guru who killed Indian soldiers and policemen in the Parliament attack.
Remember our Nuclear Weapons Policy?
The shitty no first use policy?
I respect the fact that Nuclear weapons should not be used as they lead to irreparable damage to the nation against which it is used and also for humanity. But the fact your policy says that you will not use Nuclear weapons first indicates to your enemies (and India has many!) that this state is a soft target.
The policy of no first use gives the edge to our enemies who can attack our cities first and then get away with it as once again India is known to bend over easily to foreign pressures.
Or was it really foreign pressure solely responsible for what happened in Kashmir in 1948 or for that matter stopped us from crossing the LoC in 1999 Kargil mishap?
Or is it the Foreign Pressure coupled with the disregard for the lives of our soldiers, countrymen and the general attitude about being a peace loving state? What our politicians fail to understand is that being a peace loving state does not mean you never go on an offensive! You have to be offensive to preserve your peace!
Suddenly, one day the Bangladeshi Rangers feel like venting out their frustration and having target practice and fire on Indian BSF soldiers and kill 16 of them.
What do we do?
1.Condemn the act on a global stage
2. Express ‘our deep & heartfelt sadness’ at the death of our soldiers
3. Do nothing about it.
Why do we behave like this? Why does a puny state like Bangladesh not respect us? After all they are what they are because India created them and Indian soldiers laid down their lives to free Bangladesh.
If they cannot respect this fact and fire on us we should have retaliated back with deadly force and taught them a great lesson in respecting elders. Why did we not use artillery against their posts and blast them away? Why did we not cripple their military installations just to bring them to their senses and also avoid loss of civilian life?
I respect a state like Israel for the fact that they follow the meaning of the dialogue written above to the word.Remember their 6 day war fought against Egypt? Remember the offensive they launch against Palestine (although the issue is debatable, I will just take their display of national pride into consideration) when a suicide bomber explodes himself in Israel? Once Israel’s premier Ariel Sharon had come to India on a visit and a suicide bomber blew himself up killing six, mind that only six, Israelis.
Ariel Sharon packed his bags and left. Now that is called having a value for the life of the countrymen. Each citizen is an asset and must be protected at all costs!
While back in India,the situation is merry! We have abundant population and if 50 or so people die then we can always cover up the deficit in a matter of minutes!
Remember the Dantewada massacre?
75 policemen slaughtered like insects as they were ambushed by Naxalites. (Still these men fought till their last breath!) But not much has changed. If I may guess, the infrastructure provided to these men is still bad. Bad food, Bad water. They have to battle nature as well as naxalites at the same time. The situation is not much different for our defence personnel.
Why do we stick with this sick mentality of tolerating every attack on our nation?
Why do we treat our criminals and terrorist in such a way that they become royalty?
Why do we not hit hard and nip the matter in the bud? Why do we wait for foreign intervention and the support of countries like US?
After the 1962 Himalayan blunder with China, there was a resolution passed in the parliament. The content was something like this,
“India vows to get back every inch of land that China has aggressively and illegally acquired”
This resolution now hangs framed on a wall in Indian Military Academy.
Ladies & Gentlemen, the rest as they say is history!
We have not even taken back Kashmir from Pakistan, how do we plan to take back Aksai-Chin that was lost to China? Although one commendable matter in this case is the timely acquisition of the strategically vital Siachen Glacier in 1984.
The only exception to this was the only real ‘Mard’ Prime Minister that India had. Mrs. Indira Gandhi had the guts to tell Richard Nixon at the time of India – Pakistan war of 1971 when he threatened India with his 7th Fleet to ‘Do what he wanted, The Indian Navy was more than capable of taking care of the 7th Fleet of the US Navy, but we will fight a war when our land is threatened!’ .Now that is leadership and the right attitude!
THE PAST
Shifting our focus to Shivaji Maharaj.What did he do when Chandrarao More of Jawali valley responded in a hostile manner and challenged him to enter Jawali forests and try to leave alive?
He launched an assault on him using Guerilla techniques and killed Chandrarao More and captured Jawali valley. Furthermore he strengthened the area by building a ring of forts including the famous Pratapgad where the Adilshahi general Afzalkhan was killed by Shivaji Maharaj.
THE LESSONS TO BE LEARNT
This is the attitude which India needs to adopt.Not only against attack, both diplomatic and military, by the ‘unfriendly’ states but also against internal problem creators like criminals, naxals, the underworld and the corrupt politicians.
Kill the weeds before they spoil the garden.
I will now sum up the attitude that India must adopt in the form of the above dialogue.
आले, तर त्यांच्या सोबत!
नाही आले, तर त्यांच्या शिवाय!
आणि आडवे आले, तर त्यांच्या छाताडावर पाय देऊन!
पण हिंदुस्थानचा तिरंगा हा फडकलाच पाहिजे!!
If they decide to cooperate, then we will progress with them!
If they do not cooperate, then we will progress without them!
If they try to put hurdles in our path, then we will trample then and then progress!
But the Tricolour of India shall fly high, come what may!!
Jai Hind!
Regards
Pranjal Wagh
06 Sept 2010
This work by Pranjal A. Wagh is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License
13 comments
Excellent! very well written n also very informative!!
@Abhishek
so which part do u not agree with?:)
Thanks for the compliments!
Pranjal, I agree with almost all of what you have written. I like the aggression.
Great work dude…v all shud spread this msg till our governmnt wakes up… .. 🙂
Liked the last set of lines 🙂 .. asach lihaat raha .. MBA madhye busy zaala tari ..
If MBA gives me time, I will blog while studying for MBA!
If MBA doesn’t give me time, I will still blog while studying for MBA!
If too many busy schedules create hurdles in my path, then I will trample them and then blog!
But the there has to be atleast one new blogpost on my blog every week, come what may!!
Jai Waghoba!
@Ojus
hehehe…thanks for the comment…
Now something for you
If job gives me time, I will play guitar while ‘jobbing’
If job doesnt give me time, I will still play guitar
If the boss creates hurdles in my path, I will break my guitar on his fat head, buy a new awesome axe and still continue to melt some faces everyday, come what may!
Jai Ojoba!
Jai Naroba!
😀 😀
hey bravo.. dis cldnt have been written in a better way. i cld actually feel the pouring emotions.
but my frnd taking up a point dat Mrs.Indira Gandhi was the only real ‘Mard’ Prime Minister that India had sounds a bit exaggerated to me.. with all due respect to wat she did for this country d only thing i want to say is dat she was assassinated by her own fellow “non-terrorist” patriot countryman. A LEADER for me is d one who moves forward wth his/her group. but if she was killed by a member of her dat “group” it shows dat she was not effective enough.. how can she hurt the sentiments of d SIKHS who are still considered as the most patriot lot n have been serving d country wth dere blood..
ur post is just amazing.. hats off to u….
@Harshit
True, she was assassinated by her own Sikh bodyguard for she did in a way hurt the Sikh sentiments by ordering the Army to storm the Golden Temple in Operation Bluestar.But she did that in the best interests of the country and she dealt with the Khalistanis as the anti-national elements and not as those of a particularr religion 🙂
Also, in my opinion, we should always take the best things done by a person and learn from them. That is primarily the reason why I highlighted her actions.
Thanks a ton for the comment!!
This laid back attitude was inscribed in us during the time of our struggle for independence. Mahatma Gandhi was instrumental in getting independence for our country. But I strongly believe, in the absence of Mahatma Gandhi, we would have got independence much earlier.Had people like Bhagat Singh been allowed to take struggle in their own hands, We could have got Independent India much before 1947!
As you rightly mentioned about Israel, I too salute that nation. Even Uncle Sam would think 10 times before attacking Israel. India has been very wrong in selecting its partner for defense deals. Why does India have to run behind US for that matter? Israel is a better friend of India any given day.
This government of ours can’t even handle naxalism – a complete internal matter of India. So just imagine what if tomorrow you wake up to hear China attacking India? It would be like a cricket match between Australia and Bangladesh – If you play 100 matches, Bangladesh has a probability of winning 1 match. It is a pity that some so called intellectuals like Arundhati Roy also support Naxals on this issue. Bloody why do they turn a blind eye when any security force personnel is either Kidnapped or killed?
As some friend of yours mentioned, I totally agree that Indira Gandhi is the best Prime Minister we ever had. She had the guts to do things, which a leader of opposite sex can only dream of!
How long would it take for government to realise that forces has to used against Naxals? Does talks ever bring us to conclusion; especially in modern times? By that logic, we are talking with Pakistan on Kashmir issue ever since the partition of India, and so it should have been resolved by now!
Pranjal, this is really worth thinking, buddy!
The state of affairs in our country need to be changed, sometimes it feels that Authoritarian China is very much better off than our’s India…..
The system at the core needs to be tough n active to be able to make hardcore decisions without keeping a soft corner for anyone or anything.
All Indians would cherish the day when this country would be able to FINALLY STAND FIRM ON IT’S FEET and protect the country’s as well as the citizen’s interests!
Jai Hind!
Applause!
Just a view point..
Not punishing the guilty, a feeble law practice & the alike, as outlined is all outcome of some policies made post independence. One of it being, we do not hang (death penalty) on humanitarian grounds. There is tremendous pressure on lawyers to bring justice, well blame our form of Government or blame politicians, because which act of crime would you prove it worth giving a death penalty? Money plays its own game almost every time? and on day to day basis there are so many acts on crime, how do you scale it? Just few days back a news stated “person held guilty of robbery punished for 7 years imprisonment” the guilty was a rag picker & on the other hand a person whose photographs are caught on a CCTV whilst killing as many as 200 people and charged guilty of breaking some 20-30 laws, or even more, is being protected in a special cell. Do we really need to prove to the world what law practice we follow? The Ajmal Kasab’s case is just pure example of showing the world how best law practice we follow in our country. There are several cases with our Hon. President for approval for death penalty, because its a different tag labelled.
You have done a good research on this. Keep it up.
Pranjal….Good one man…
Today very few students like history subject ( IT ka Jamana hai Bhai !! ), but we know History repeats itself one or other way….We need to take lessons from it to avoid mistakes in future.
India definitely need to learn from History.
I think Democracy is best and worst thing in India. and Also Gandhiji is best and worst person to born in India.
Our democracy doesn’t allow us to take such decisions as in case of Shivaji Maharaj only Maharaj were taking decision, but look at today’s situation in India where it takes days/months to take unanimous decision in countries favor. In that also some will be against it. Some authoritarian kind of ruling is required to take country forward ( Like Presently in Gujrat – Narendra Modi ).
Coming to Gandhiji, I agree with Sujan. If Lokmanya Tilak could have lived little more and such more leaders were there we could have got freedom much earlier. The Gift of “Ahinsa” from Gandhiji is coming in our way to tackle issues like Kashmir, Naxlities, Terrorism etc. We want to follow gandhijis marg, but at same time we forgot the way Shown by Lord Krishna. In Geeta he told this is Kalyug. Every thing is fair in War, and we are fighting a war against this issues. Dont give chance to enemy to rise his head, cut it. Lord Krishna himself Shisupal after forgiving 100 times to his mistakes, India is great than Lord Krishna to forgive Pak more than 100 times.
I feel we need to live in Kalyug and fight with our enemies, else which will lead to destruction of our country. Follow the path shown by Gods/History.
Hi pranal
Very true indeed….I feel somewhat similar frustration is running through every mind of young generation…Btw i feel Lal bahadur shastri’s stance during Indo-pak war shld also not to be forgotten…rather that was the first instance of solid leadership..followed with Mrs. Indira gandhi..watever… looking at the current affairs ..be it CWG games or chineses aggressions or hiking of US VISA fees or betting in the cricket… the pbm lies in the attitude and mindset of indians ..& unfortunate to say but something miserable , drastic and destructive even at mass level may open the eyes of us …untill then we will keep living in miserable , confused , unknown and hopeless indentity at international stage…that is ‘INDIAN’ …thanks to the democracy and their leaders !