Daily Times

December 16 has turned into a black day for South Asia. On this day, in 1971, Bangladesh gained victory after many Bengalis were killed, tortured and raped. In 2012, a young paramedical student, Nirbhaya, was gangraped and murdered on the roads of south Delhi and, in 2014, 132 school students and nine staff members of the Army Public School, Peshawar were killed by cadres of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). All three incidents are turning points in South Asia’s history, yet they have failed to have their deeper impacts on state and society. As a result, intermittently, such incidents have kept on repeating. The moot reason for this is the decision influencing majority displays outbursts only over selective incidents that smack them.

After the liberation of Bangladesh, the exploited turned into ‘new’ exploiters. In India, Nirbhaya’s incident prompted many to block the streets in New Delhi but similar cases in Kohima or Imphal, in the past, have not even been known to the majority. Likewise, the cowardly, barbaric and dastardly attack by the cadres of the TTP on the Army Public School, Peshawar is being condemned by almost every sane individual but, in the same spirit, even a small gathering has never come out against the killing of children in Waziristan or Afghanistan in connection to an almost decade long ongoing anti-terror offensive. According to a report on drone strikes published in The Guardian, “An estimated 142 children were killed in pursuing 24 men, only six of whom died in the course of drone strikes that killed their intended targets.” According to The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, between 2004 and April 2014, 168 to 202 children have been killed in drone strikes in the Af-Pak region. The number may double or triple if one also takes into account conventional military operations, killings due to crossfire between security personnel and terrorists, and the use of children as human shields by the terrorists. Unfortunately, there was no fury over those killings; instead these killings are often justified as part of ‘collateral’ damage. With the exception of some journalists, scholars and other individuals, nobody has dared to raise questions about the efficacy of those operations and the number of victims under the category of collateral damage.

Strategically, in the present situation, instead of chalking out a concrete plan to fight against terrorist groups and militants, the Pakistan government has hurriedly decided to intensify the ongoing operations in its northern areas. Daily Times reported that the army chief, General Raheel Sharif, reiterated his vow to eliminate them (TTP). According to another report, posted on Facebook by Shujaat Bukhari, editor of Rising Kashmir, “Pakistan’s prime minister has lifted the moratorium on executions — in place since 2008 — for offences related to terrorism.” Both of them have backing from the Pakistani middle class. This means the level of violence is going to increase further without the guarantee that such a massacre will not take place in future.

In 2008, after the Mumbai mayhem, India faced a similar situation. The Indian middle class came out with the swift conclusion that, as Pakistan was responsible for it, it has to be destroyed or at least hit hard. Some of the news anchors, security ‘experts’ and members of civil society were vehemently demanding that Pakistan be nuked. The opposition in parliament was unequivocal in demanding a stern military action. Even a section of the bureaucratic establishment gave the green signal to carry out operations inside Pakistan. It was very difficult to pacify all of them but the then prime minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, steadfastly maintained his position of no military engagement with Pakistan. His decision saved the two countries from another catastrophic war. On the contrary, the two Sharifs have failed to control their nerves. They have to accept that their conventional military operations have failed to eliminate terrorists and provide security to the common Pakistani citizen, so there is a need to sketch out a new strategy to fight against the menace. In this new plan the level of violence against non-combatants in the northern areas has to be highly restrained and curtailed.

Finally, by killing school children, the TTP has crossed all limits of barbarism. But, as a representative of so-called civil society, the Pakistani establishment should not retaliate in a similar way. Unfortunately, voices in support of them are likely to be decimated after this ghastly incident. Before provoking the army, the Pakistani ‘nationalist’ class must remember that many of their citizens, including non-school going children, have died peacefully to serve their so-called national interests. None of them shed tears, blackened their Facebook profile picture, or lit a candle in their memory. The day their tears and pain become a part of Pakistan’s ‘collective conscience’ things may begin to improve. Hope for no more small coffins, not even in Waziristan, because they are the heaviest to carry.

The writer specialises in Indian internal security and foreign policy as well as regional water conflicts