The hapless hostages and crew members of the hijacked IC 814 have finally returned home. But the nation cannot forget the crisis by merely heaving a sigh of relief. Close on the heels of the Kargil war, the Kandahar episode has come as yet another classic example of the Vajpayee government's comprehensive failure on the sensitive subject of national security.
What price has the country had to pay for securing this end to the hijacking episode after one full week? The release of three top terrorists is perhaps only the visible part of the deal. Among the invisible components of the deal are the praises showered on the Taliban amounting to a virtual recognition of the ruling establishment of Afghanistan. We can also see the shadow of the invisible long hand of US imperialism. But beyond the various cost components of the deal, the Vajpayee government has also contributed to the shattering of several illusions concerning its fabled strength and determination, and commitment to national honour.
The early bungling at the Raja Sansi airport of Amritsar exposed the government's timidity to take on cross-country terrorism. By all accounts, the hijackers were known not to possess any sophisticated weapon and any government with necessary alertness and security preparedness could have possibly prevented the hijackers from taking off from its own soil. For all the rhetorics of Vajpayee and Advani about India's becoming a nuclear power and an effective state under the saffron order, the hijacking has once again exposed the vulnerability of the Indian state.
The humiliation of BJP's "proud and powerful" (nuclear-powered and Hindutva-propelled!) nationalism at the altar of the much-demonised Islamic terrorism was complete with the External Affairs minister Jaswant Singh himself having to fly down to Kandahar to hand over the three released terrorists (true to their characteristic hypocrisy, the saffron spokesmen are of course claiming that he had gone there to receive the hostages!). India's attempts to implicate Pakistan were also not taken seriously and except routine low-key statements lamenting the hijacking India could not enlist any global support in its so-called war against transnational terrorism in spite of the fact that the hostages also included four Japanese nationals and one US citizen. Clinton only chose this occasion to remind the international community that Kashmir remained one of the most dangerous issues in the new millennium! So much for India's claims to success in the field of anti-terrorist diplomacy!
Having bungled at Amritsar and allowed the episode to linger for one full week, the government was eventually left with little other option than releasing three key terrorists including a British citizen, Ahmad Omar Sayeed Sheikh. Had the government responded quickly it could have probably secured an early end by releasing only the Harkat-ul-Mujahadeen cleric Maulana Masood Azhar. But the government chose to await the American response in the guise of UN intervention and the price only went up from one to three terrorists. A humbled Vajpayee government is now trying to cover up its unabashed display of wavering and weakness by mounting a renewed jingoistic offensive against Pakistan. But given the cooperation officially extended by the Pakistan's new regime and its declaration to arrest the hijackers, India's anti-Pak campaign is unlikely to cut much ice with the international community. Unfortunately, the opportunist Left has taken upon itself the responsibility of advising the BJP government precisely on how to intensify the campaign against Pakistan. The revolutionary Left and other patriotic democratic forces must focus primarily on pinning down the Vajpayee government on the many facets of its internal failure and on the failure of its shady Kashmir diplomacy with the United States.
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