honestly now have absolutely no faith in any of these politicians…no matter who takes charge

As long as there are officers like them who will march forward to face these bullies and terriorist without a pause , Indian spirit can be broken.

I remember George W Bush’s statement after 9/11 “Make No Mistake”, if you remember, and for all that he may or may not have done, that speech has a message, a statement which gave you the feeling that he is concerned and will do something about the situation.

Indian politician’s don’t have much imagination, and hence they repeat the tired formula of ISI-behind-it after anything has gone wrong. That is so 1990s! Give us a break – terrorism today is far more sinister, far more grassroots and far less controllable.

I think our government needs to wake up [Shivraj Patil definitely sounded very sleepy] and look for solutions in other places. What about tackling the mafia in Mumbai? Do you think this could be organized without inside help? Things like a trunk-full of grenades kept waiting at the Taj or Oberoi, for example? Transport solutions inside the city [how else do you carry around assualt weapons]? Can we expect to Dawood, among others, walk the gallows anytime soon?

Time to act, surely.

The events of the past 48 hours indicates completely dysfunctional intelligence forces. The entire state security machinery was caught completely surprised and off-guard, unable to comprehend the true scale of the attacks and completely flummoxed as to the protocols of response to be enforced. The top cops (Karkare – chief of ATS, Salaskar – encounter specialist, Kamte – additional CP) perished in the first hour of this tragedy, not because of bravery, but simply because they under-calculated the scale and planning of the terrorists. This sense of under-calculation was combined with woefully inadequate equipment (shoddy looking ‘bullet-proof’ jackets and flimsy looking helmets) and extremely uncoordinated efforts led to their untimely demise.

The tragic events of the past two days has only tarnished India’s credibility as a stable and peaceful democratic society. It can only mean a further degradation in the way the world perceives India for its tourist/business friendlyness and shall impact its standing in the world. It also further frustrates the people of this country, who in the past couple of years have had little respite from all kinds of extremist attacks.

We have proved time and again to be completely inept at dealing with contingencies and disasters – natural or human. This event only further highlights the extent of paralysis amongst security forces in the immediate aftermath of such terrorist attacks. We need to urgently establish strong channels of intelligence gathering and also put in place strong and unambiguous protocols of engagement with these terrorists. Questions about the chain of command, the union govt’s involvement with state security agencies, etc. must be sorted by putting in place a comprehensive framework for synchronization of various state and union security forces.

For all of our trumpeting about our technological prowess and moon-touching capabilities, we are far away from providing economic and social equity and security to the masses. The terrorists have reminded us rather brutally, that our sense of pride and ego is misplaced, that in spite of the progress we seem to have made, we are extremely vulnerable to disruptions of normality. I think we as Indians have to start being a little more humble and sombre, realizing that for all that we have achieved, there is indeed much much more that needs to be done. We, as members of general society, must move decisively to ensure that politicians enforce measures and mechanisms to ensure such incidents are not repeated.