The February massacre
An detail of terror attack that happened in Pulwama and the tragic aftermath
Honestly, there is a lot to unpack considering the events that have happened from February 14th till today. It started as a terror attack by a monster and went on to be escalated as a possible India-Pakistan war, but that’s not even scratching the surface of what happened. What irked me the most is the politics, the elements within India that left no stone un-turned to praise Pak and demean India as well as the people who went as far as to demean our soldiers. Since this will take some time I want to take things one by one. All links to facts are underlined.
The broad sequence of events
Feb 14th- An SUV filled with explosives rammed in to a bus that was ferrying jawans from Central reserve police force in Lethpora, Pulwama district killing about 40 personnel.
A video surfaced of the attacker named “Adil Ahmed Dar” an operative of the Jaish-E-Mohammed, claiming the attack, but the other thing he said was bone chilling. His attack according to him was to kill Hindus
Feb15th-25th- Massive Outrage and politicisation across the nation. People not just in India but across the globe talking about revenge. India works to put as much pressure on Pakistan which remains in denial. Pakistans Most Favoured Nation tag stripped and India raises import duty by 200% on all goods from Pakistan. Security beefed up across the country especially in Jammu and Kashmir.
Feb 26th- At 3:30 am India sends Mirage 2000 fighter jets deep inside Pakistan. India claims they have destroyed camps of Jaish-e-mohammed. Pakistan claims that payloads were dropped but no damage was done. Massive celebrations in India
Feb 27th- Pakistan responds by sending it’s F-16 jets, India engages in a dogfight resulting in one F-16 down and loss of one Mig-21 by India. Pakistan loses one pilot and captures Indian pilot, Wing Cdr. Abhinandan Varthaman. Amid escalating tensions, Pakistan goes on admin emergency with Blackouts and closed airspace along with heavy troop movement.
Feb 28th- Pakistan PM announces release of the captured pilot as a ‘peace gesture’ , while ceasefire violations continue across the border.
March 1st- Wing Commander Abhinandan is released in line with the Geneva treaty as both countries exchange fire in Kashmir.
The ugly truth
While the broad facts only cover a part of the event, it is time to address the ugly truth, there are a section of the media, politicians and even citizens that have used every bit of this event to further their cause. Let’s address a few of them. All of these are before India’s fitting reply
a) Randeep Surjewala’s 56 inch comment- 2 hours into the attack and Congress’s Randeep Surjewala instead of standing with the country and the forces, immediately targeted his guns at Narendra Modi
b) Was Modi enjoying in Jim Corbett even after knowing about the attack- Another claim was that even after knowing about the attack, Modi continued his boat ride and snacks till late evening, however government sources claim otherwise
c) Humanising the terrorist- This one was more disturbing, while every terrorist is considered a monster, there were attempts made by our own media to humanise Adil Ahmad Dar by showing him as a victim rather than a the monster that he is.
d) Sleeper cells activated- Call it whatever you want, but when you have certain sections of your own people celebrating and enjoying the fact that a terrorist activity has happened in your country the word anti-national is justified. Several vigilant citizens reported these people who come from various sections of the society to get them fired, suspended from college. or arrested.
e) Caste politics- Again the media shows its ugly side when Caravan puts out an article where it chose to disrespect the forces by counting the castes of the martyrs. A case was filed against the author later on.
India’s response and the politics that followed
In the wee hours of 26th February a tweet came out by Pakistani general Asif Ghafoor that India dropped a payload but did no damage. Media hype was at its highest as channles started claiming destruction of 2–3 JeM terror camps and death of terrorist numbers that ranged from 200–500. Later on India issued a press briefing and confirmed that Mirage 2000 fighters went to Pakistan and dropped bombs on terror camps. Immediately all of India’s diplomatic channels went into overdrive across the globe to gather support.
a) Diplomats across the world and the UN were updated about the attack
b) Support comes in from all countries
c) China shows restraint and asks Pakistan to tackle the menace of terrorism
d) Four countries move to UN Security council to declare Masood Azhar as a terrorist.
e) US is investigating Pakistan using F-16 against India violating the terms of their use.
While this was ongoing another group came out as strong as possible and called for peace. Here is where the problem lies, this group targeted Indian government for warmongering and called for peace even though Pakistan violated ceasefire and all India did was attack terror camps without touching civilian and military installations. This is the same group that gets active all the time and not listening to the fact that we need to tell this to Pakistan.
Things really go out of hand when Pakistan releases the captive pilot as a “peace gesture” and the people over here go gaga
The problem is that while all of this was happening on our side, Pakistan was busy proving they are not at all serious and will probably not mend their ways
a) Pakistan’s foreign minister admitted they were in contact with JeM
b) In the Pakistan Legislative assembly, they justified all that happened in Pulwama
c) JeM admits they were attacked by IAF
The problem lies, that while this was happening in Pakistan. So many of our own politicians were politicising the issue.
a) BS Yeddurappa of BJP claims strike will help them get more seats
b) Navjot Sidhu praises Pakistan
c) Opposition continuously asks for proof even though IAF has clarified they hit the intended target
c) Congress blasts government to the extent that it helps Pakistan. Here’s a shot from Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf’s twitter handle
There are many more things that happened but I was not able to cover, such as Pakistan’s humiliation at OIC, or blatant attempt to show that Modi prioritises functions over national security.
The Final word
This episode is far from over as we can expect things to continue in one direction. What I see is no side will leave out the opportunity to use this during the upcoming elections. However I do see several sections of the media and political spectrum using this as an opportunity to blast the government and giving Pakistan an upper hand as we have started to see.
It saddens me to see that some people are so eager to lick Pakistan’s boot, that they will demean our forces and the country. I also see weight in Narendra Modi’s words that some people hate him so much that they have started hating the country as I don’t remember a time before 2014 that Pakistan quoted any Indian media house or political party to get the upper hand on them. At a time when the nation needs to show unity more than ever, we also need to unite and expose each and everyone working against national interest.
