Author: Chandan Mitra
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: November 8, 2002
A huge outcry has been generated
in sections of the media, both print and electronic, over the circumstances
in which two persons were shot dead by Delhi Police in an encounter inside
the basement of the Ansal Plaza shopping mall in South Delhi on November
3.
The police are being subjected to
a virtual inquisition since. A volley of questions is being directed at
them with the aim of proving that the duo was killed in cold blood in a
stage-managed operation. The National Human Rights Commission (which should
more appropriately rename itself National Terrorist Rights Commission),
has predictably grabbed the opportunity to arrogate some limelight onto
itself by issuing a notice to the police. Professional human rights walas
are screaming 'foul' from every available rooftop and television studio.
In the orchestrated din, the basic issues involved have been given an indecent
burial.
Regardless of the precise sequence
of events, is there any question that the two persons shot dead were terrorists?
Has anybody questioned the fundamental point that both were Pakistani nationals?
Is it anybody's case that they had come to India without valid travel documents?
Can it be argued that they were at Ansal Plaza only for the purpose of
shopping for their friends and family back home? Is it being suggested
that the Delhi Police first stole a car for their benefit, compelled them
to drive around the city, directed them to a predetermined encounter venue
inside a crowded shopping mall and then shot the obliging victims dead
at point-blank range?
In the competitive rush to paralyse
the morale of the law-enforcing agencies, the amateur investigators of
the media have drawn firm blinkers across their eyes. Into this fray has
also jumped in an alleged "eyewitness", a doctor to boot, claiming that
he saw the two "sleepy" or "sedated" terrorists get out of the car, "barely
able to walk". That these sleepy/sedated desperadoes were fit enough to
drive the car across the city and into the Plaza basement appears to have
eluded all media sleuths.
However, these are not the central
questions. The media has every right to probe any action by the authorities
and make them accountable. The issue is the impact of such inquisitions
on those engaged in ensuring the security of the country and its people.
Some years ago, former Prime Minister Narasimha Rao had remarked, "It seems
in this country only terrorists have human rights." He said this in the
context of some appaling interventions by the judiciary against patriotic
officers of the Punjab Police and the baying of certain self-styled sentinels
of civil liberties. Mr Rao's observation is as valid today as when it was
made. Assuming for a moment that every question raised by the media and
the NHRC is valid, how does that detract from the Police's achievement
in liquidating two foreign terrorists? Given the alarming track record
of the judiciary in (not) convicting terrorists, can the authorities be
blamed for devising more effective ways of dispatching malevolent merchants
of murder and mayhem? Each time terrorists succeed in penetrating security
cordons and carry out carnage, the police are the first to be blamed for
failing to protect innocent lives. It has been repeatedly proved that terrorists
lodged in jails pose a serious threat to civil society as their comrades
outside indulge in daredevil acts to get them freed. The example of Masood
Azhar of the Kandahar "infame" is a case in point. Because we failed to
send him to the gallows through the six years he was in our custody, we
were forced to escort him to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan from where he journeyed
to Pakistan to set up Jaish-e-Mohammad which has been responsible for causing
several hundred deaths in India.
What are security agencies expected
to do in this background? Roll out the red-carpet for wannabe Masood Azhars
and allow them to carry out large-scale depredations?
The battle against terrorism has
to be fought in every nook and cranny of the country, crowded shopping
malls not excluded. It is not material if the two who were felled in Delhi
last Sunday were actually plotting a repeat of Akshardham. It is not material
if they had grenades or explosives strapped to their bodies. All that is
relevant is that they were Pakistanis and terrorists. And they lived by
the gun. Because they lived by the gun, they deserved to die by the gun.
If necessary, hundreds of such encounters may have to be carried out before
Pakistan finally realises it cannot cow India down to submission, the breast-beating
of its misguided human rights walas notwithstanding.
