After a long hiatus, I am forced today to blog - more out of anguish and anger. Anguish at the meaningless loss : of human life, dignity to a secure living and life as also property. Anger at the way we have been waiting for deliverance from these by our politicians and babus.
It is these 2 institutions that need to be questioned. I'm not even sure who the bigger culprit is ? Is it the IAS babu who is secure in his / her babudom or is it the politician working the vote banks to get ahead ?
Atleast, with politicians, we the citizens have to take part of the blame in having elected them. However, how about the Babus ?
I see the TV and listen to people mouth the same requirement again and again - co-ordination between the forces, secure border etc. How can we get that when we arm our forces (BSF, Coast gaurd, Police etc) with ancient .22 and .303 rifles / revolvers that are from WWII vintage and NO technology upgradation ?
I did not see night vision glasses, I did not see good smoke masks, I did not see even basic things like body armour. We push these dedicated people to the front and sing to their martyrdom, wait to shake their warm hands when they come back out live ?
I also do not think the structure is a problem - it is just execution.
There is "supposed" to be an emergency cell - atleast this was put together after the Tsunami disaster. There is supposed to be better intelligence sharing. There is a National Security Advisor !!. However, it is the effectiveness that is lacking.
What can be done. Here are a few suggestions - for whatever it is worth.
- Get a "technology" upgrade done immediately with state of the art equipment
- Get the local police and the central teams trained on these new equipment including things like frequency jammers and email traces.
- Get some of the key areas (atleast the public areas like Stations, airports etc) under 100% video surviellance ALL the time.
- Step up random checks on all the roads leading to major cities as also the coast.
I'm not sure if there is a 100% solution - atleast we should make it difficult and with no single point of failure. More importantly, we should pass this set itself to a professional team and not one made up of Politicians and Babus !
Hi Ravi
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, by pointing our fingers to the Politicians and Babus, you have found a easy scapegoat. It is time when we looked at ourselves. The problem may probably lie there. How many of us can claim that we have never paid bribes. When we pay the bribe the first time, we have started the rot. The same policeman takes a bribe from you and I when we are caught for drunken driving. How can you expect him to suddenly differentiate between a drunken driver and someone carrying explosives in the boot of the car. For him the money is what matters.
Arindam,
ReplyDeletePoint taken - infact, we did have a big debate on this last week as part our FRNV initiative (Foundation for Restoration of National Values).
Let me give you the synopsis of 2 different viewpoints
View A : There is a difference between a bribe which is the equivalent of "speed" money. In some ways, the TIP that is in practice is no different. Hence, if there is work needed to be done and the standard process takes 10 days, maybe "speed" money will compensate. However, bribe is an impact where there is a LAW being broken
View B : There is no difference between speed money and money paid as bribe to get out of a "situation"
The reason I'm posting both these views is that in some ways, we are rationalizing the process. The key point of reference should be
- Will we let anything happen that we'd NOT like to see happen to ourselves ?
PS : In my opinion (esp. if you disagree with viewpoint A very strongly) - you need to note that ALL of the government's "TATKAL" schemes in a way legalizes this. The only difference is that in the Tatkal process, the exchequer benefits ?