The scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, Rahul Gandhi, on the anniversary of the Pulwama Terror Attack once again demonstrated precisely why the Congress party has been decimated electorally across the country. On the completion of one year of the heinous act of terrorism that claimed the life of over forty of our CRPF Jawans, the former Congress president decided that the best path forward was to insinuate that the attack was orchestrated by the NDA Government at the Center.
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Rahul Gandhi asked three loaded questions on the 14th of February, the anniversary of the Pulwama attack, all of which were pointed towards blaming the Modi government for what happened. We shall address these questions one at a time.
Q1: Who benefitted from the Pulwama attack?
The first question asked, “Who benefitted the most from the attack?” Needless to say, nobody benefits from a terrorist attack itself. The only consequence of terrorism is unmitigated tragedies. Only utter mora bankruptcy could lead someone to ask who benefited from terrorism.
Having said that, it’s only in the responses to such acts of barbarism that benefits and losses are incurred by civilized society. In the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attack, when the mainstream media engaged in self-censorship, they gave in to the demands of the Jihadists which had perpetrated the attack to silence all critics and ridicule of their religion. On that occasion, and several other similar incidents, the terrorists benefitted the most. When liberals engage in self-censorship and silence critics of Islam claiming that mockery is justification enough for terrorism, the Jihadists win.
Contrary to that, when the NDA government retaliated in full measure against Pakistan following the Pulwama attack, India benefitted as a nation. The government may have accrued political benefits from the Balakot airstrikes but its Indians who benefited the most because the airstrikes serve as a deterrent against Pakistani state-sponsored terrorism. If the UPA government in 2008 had acted in a similar manner post the Mumbai attacks, Indians would have benefited in a similar manner and no one would have complained if the UPA government had accrued political benefits out of it. The nation comes first.
Apart from the Balakot Airstrikes, the government has also maintained its relentless efforts to wipe out terrorism from the valley. Simultaneously, India has also upped the ante against the Pakistan establishment on the diplomatic front. As a consequence, Pakistan finds itself isolated and after Article 370 was abrogated by the Indian Government, not even Pakistan’s traditional allies have sided with it apart from Turkey, China, and Malaysia. Therefore, most certainly, Pakistan has not been allowed to benefit from the terror attack.
The only people who benefit from terror attacks regardless of the responses to it are vultures such as Rahul Gandhi himself who love to feed themselves off the corpses of our fallen warriors. The sole objective of such people is to seek avenues for personal benefit. No tragedy is devastating enough for sombre moments of reflection and selfless solidarity. No land is sacred enough for unconditional loyalty. Only politics matters, seeking power for the sake of it is an end in and of itself.
Q2: The Inquiry into the Pulwama Attack
The second question Rahul Gandhi asked was, “What is the outcome of the inquiry into the attack?” It’s a valid question but at the same time, people have to remember that such investigations usually take a long time to complete. Furthermore, the terrorist attack was influenced and orchestrated by terrorists from lands where India does not have a physical jurisdiction yet. Therefore, it is inevitable for the investigation to hit roadblocks.
“There are many unanswered questions as all the perpetrators who could have helped in piecing together the investigation were killed in encounters. The car used in the attack had changed hands several times. The last person to own the vehicle- Sajjad Bhat went on to join Jaish hours before he could be caught. He was later killed in an encounter,” one official was quoted as saying by The Hindu.
“Had we recovered samples from a bomb that had not exploded, then tracing the source would have been easier on the basis of its composition and usage pattern. In Pulwama, all we could get was charred remains,” the official added. In addition to that, some suspects have also been killed by security forces during encounters in the valley since then. It has made the investigation more difficult. However, it is known that Jaish-e-Muhammad has claimed responsibility for the terror attack. The terrorist himself used the ‘Gaumutra’ slur, a slur hugely popular among liberals, in the video that was recorded prior to the suicide bombing.
A supplementary charge sheet has also been filed by the NIA two days ago against four aides of the Pulwama Attack mastermind in a case pertaining to terrorism. The supplementary charge sheet was filed against four Jaish-e-Muhammad operatives under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 121 A (waging, or attempting to wage war, or abetting waging of war, against the government of India) of IPC, and various sections of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and sections of Explosives Substances Act.
“Investigation has established that the accused persons are members of proscribed terrorist organisation JeM, who were planning to carry out terrorist attacks and propagating the activities of JeM,” the NIA said. “The slain terrorist Mudassir Ahmad Khan was the mastermind behind this conspiracy. He was one of the main conspirators in Pulwama terror attack as well and was killed in an encounter with police and security forces in Tral area of district Pulwama J&K on March 10, last year,” the NIA said.
Q3. Who has been held accountable?
The third question the former Congress President asked was, “Who in the BJP Govt has yet been held accountable for the security lapses that allowed the attack?” Again, while there were security lapses without a doubt, it also has to be remembered that our security establishment has to be successful hundred percent of the times but the terrorists have to succeed only once. While it is in the best interests of everyone that adequate action is taken against those who were found to err, it is also only appropriate that it is done quietly in order to ensure that the natural order of affairs within the establishment is not disrupted.
With regard to the question as to who has been held accountable in the BJP government for the attack, the ordinary citizen understands perfectly that none of the Ministers were individually responsible for the attack. The only thing a Minister can do in such terrible circumstances is extending condolences to the families of the martyrs and ensure that their sacrifice hasn’t gone in vain, the only thing they can ensure is that their sacrifice is avenged. In the absence of clear misconduct, no one expects ministers to offer their resignation in response to acts of terrorism. However, the country does expect them to step up and fulfil the oath they swore to the nation.
Rahul Gandhi would do well to remember the conduct of his own party in the aftermath of the Mumbai Terror Attacks. Digvijay Singh attended the launch of a book that blamed the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh for the terror attack. No action has been taken against him for his deplorable conduct. The Minority Affairs Minister in the UPA government, A.R. Antulay, had claimed that ‘Hindutva terrorists’ were behind the death of Hemant Karkare.
Antulay did not have to pay any price for his conduct. Even the U.S. ambassador observed that the Congress party chose to ‘pander to Muslim fears‘ for the sake of politics. No one from the Congress has ever paid a price for that. No Congress politician has ever paid the price for attempting to invent the mythical saffron terrorism either.
Rahul Gandhi would do well to reflect upon why his party is in the situation it is today. A huge part of it is the manner in which he has chosen to conduct himself. It is because he has chosen to sacrifice national interests at the altar of crazy conspiracy theories, it is because he has refused to take action against people from his own party for casting aspersions on the surgical strikes and airstrikes conducted by the Indian Army, it is because he has chosen to play politics over fallen warriors that the Congress party has been decimated in large parts across the country and has lost in the manner that it has in national politics.