About two hours ago, I listened to Obama's address to the Congress announcing his new plan for Afghanistan and Pakistan. His two-pronged plan aims at fighting the Taliban in both the countries with renewed vigour and also providing financial help to the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan for reviving their terror-battered economies. Obama's stress is on widespread social changes in both these countries for the betterment of the large mass of uneducated people to free them from the clutches of the orthodox Taliban.
While listening to Obama's logical pleas to the Congress for enabling him fight the scourge of terrorism, our own Varun Gandhi's recent vitriolic speech came to mind. Shouldn't the young Varun draw a lesson from Obama's book? Varun's bullet-for-bullet philosophy may appeal to many young Hindus who are led to believe that they are living as second-rate citizens in their own country. But the truth, which Varun and the Saffron brigade must understand, is that suppressing terrorism by force is only a temporary solution. For a long-term solution, you have to do the social engineering and bring the terrorist into the country's mainstream.
I personally believe that common cultural heritage, not religion, can truly bond a people. Had religion been a cementing force, Nepal, the only Hindu country in the world, would have never appeared to us as hobnobbing with China against India whose population is largely Hindu. The saffron brigade should know that by dividing people in the name of religion you may rule for a while. But the second shot at the power is a distatnt possibility. The saffron brigade knows this fact too well. Had the religion and the Ram temple been truly residing in the heart of the people, no power on earth could have ousted the BJP-led NDA government.
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