Pulwama Attack

[Supratik]

They have been banned multiple times. It is a eye wash to stop India from taking action. They will be back in action after some time.

[syam]

If you know its offtopic, why post it here? @chetak ji, dont give the oxygen of publicity to rags like Caravan. These are not commercial enterprises, but propaganda outlets to propagate the views of White money-bags, foreign governments, because really.. If they dont tell the brown folk how to feel, how will the brown folk ever be civilized? In the ultimate calculate, they do not matter, except perhaps as convenient foils for counter propaganda.

Well, it's important. People talk like we don't do anything for Indian muslims. We did good for them plenty. We never touched their lands. Treated them like brothers even if the partition happened. What more any society can do? I am genuinely surprised by the words of some folks.

Some vested interests trying to instigate communal disharmony in our country through this attack. We should counter this vicious propaganda of fake discrimination.

[ArjunPandit]

They have been banned multiple times. It is a eye wash to stop India from taking action. They will be back in action after some time.

whats funny is they have run out of any new tricks to pull up.
1. 1993 was domestic job in retaliation of 1992
2. 2001-02 was banning/renaming of organizations
3. 2006-2007 were revenge of 2002, ban etc
4. 2008 was non state actors
5. 2016: Surgical strike didnt happen
6. 2019: we're living in the matrix and there's no spoon

[Karan M]

BTW in a case of fratricide, a paki mujahid pilot fired a missile and shot down his wingman.

When? That was ages ago during the Afghan war, correct?

[Karthik S]

Yup.

[sudeepj]

If you know its offtopic, why post it here? @chetak ji, dont give the oxygen of publicity to rags like Caravan. These are not commercial enterprises, but propaganda outlets to propagate the views of White money-bags, foreign governments, because really.. If they dont tell the brown folk how to feel, how will the brown folk ever be civilized? In the ultimate calculate, they do not matter, except perhaps as convenient foils for counter propaganda.

Well, it's important. People talk like we don't do anything for Indian muslims. We did good for them plenty. We never touched their lands. Treated them like brothers even if the partition happened. What more any society can do? I am genuinely surprised by the words of some folks.

Some vested interests trying to instigate communal disharmony in our country through this attack. We should counter this vicious propaganda of fake discrimination.

It can be important, but still be off topic, just as your post is. There is a thread to discuss these things, Islamism and Islamophobia. I have considerable agreement with your point of view, except that this thread is not the right place to post it.

[Bart S]

Who is the author of this extremely good write-up?

[Karan M]

Yup.

Another crashed his aircraft when it was boar-ed on the runway. No kidding.
Anyhow, old news.

Right now, the Pakistanis are making a song and a dance, their twitter mujahids are screaming from their virtual minarets and nothing's happened.

[Karan M]

BartS, Anand Ranganathan. Writes well, yo-yos like a swinging yard-arm in choppy seas, on occasion.

Having said that, Modi's silence is unnerving all the Bakis.

[Rudradev]

I have a sinking feeling that all this is building up to a major series of terrorist attacks on Indian civilians DURING GE 2019 election. On strategically chosen polling places etc. all over the country, aimed at causing massive casualties across the nation. Just as in 2009, the ultimate target is the election itself.

Benefits to Pakistan and the Congress party:
1) Large-scale violence (both by terrorists, and by Congress/MGB operatives as follow-ups to the terrorist attacks) will allow Rahul Gandhi to claim the election was compromised, and demand a new election, even if INC loses (as they are likely to).

2) The fact that Modi Sarkar was unable to provide security during the scheduled 2019 election will give a huge boost to anti-BJP parties in the new election. Narratives of how Modi Sarkar's "intolerance" and "hindutva" set the stage for the violence will be circulated non stop on social media and paid conventional media.

3) If in addition to this, there is no visible retaliation against Pakistan for Pulwama before GE 2019... the angle that Modi was "soft on Pakistan", and thereby encouraged further terrorist attacks during the election cycle, will be trumpeted from every orifice.

4) In all this chaos there will be no leadership in New Delhi with the wherewithal to strike hard and prosecute a retaliatory war against Pakistan with international diplomatic support... NOTE THE US INTELLIGENCE THREAT ASSESSMENT has ALREADY prepared the ground for a narrative that any violence during GE 2019 will be Modi/BJP's fault, not to be blamed on Pakistan.

5) Thus, even if Pulwama attack seems to "help" Modi politically by uniting the country behind him, it may only be the setup for something much worse that is calculated to bring down his government by attacking the election process directly.

The one tactic with which they had at least temporary success in tarnishing Modi, for all these years, was blaming him for Gujarat 2002. It is the only thing that has worked for them to any extent. That is exactly what they will try again.

[dinesh_kimar]

Two quick data points:

1. Apparently, Masood Azhar has absolved Pakistan of the attack.
( First time ever I'm seeing a terrorist bothered about who gets blamed for an action he perpetuated. But action will come.The Indian public is unfazed by nuclear weapons, they want to pay the butcher in kind.)

2. Rajdeep Sardesai has apparently said that it would be unexciting to remove Pak from World Cup, all on the basis of one attack.

[pankajs]

1. Large scale violence during election means large scale targeting but there are far too many booth to allow for any such possibility.
2. Even a lame duck government is expected to take law and order decisions. To extend it further, it will also be expected to respond to external aggression. Just because it is lame duck does not mean it does not have law & order or defense or security responsibility or power.

[pankajs]

Masood Azhar has absolved Bakistan but absolving Bakistan is of no consequence to India or the Indian position on cross border terror.

[Shameek]

Cross LoC trade continues after Pulwama attack

Despite heightened political strain between India and Pakistan after Pulwama attack, the trade across the Line of Control continued from Uri in Kashmir and Poonch in Jammu. After the attack on February 15, at least 140 trucks crossed the LoC from this side, while as 70 trucks came from the other side carrying various items.

Link

[Shivaji]

Rudradev ji,

I have been a big fan of your writing. I tend to agree with above except on point 3 and last para.

Gujarat does not matter to general population that votes for him and those for which it matters are not relevant to him.

As for 3, my worry is that he may declare victory after a certain level of retribution only to find Pakis playing mischief again during election process. Like that dialogue in movie Lakshya, "Pakistani hamesha dobara palat ke ata hai"...

[Rudradev]

1. Large scale violence during election means large scale targeting but there are far too many booth to allow for any such possibility.

Really? The more the booths assaulted by local PFI-SIMI (or even Naxal) cells in diverse locations, and the more the "retaliations" carried out by local paid-goonda militias in response, the harder the maintenance of law and order will be. We've seen what happens in WB and Kerala even in normal times... how difficult would it be for much worse to occur in a number of opposition-controlled states, including the recently-Congi heartland? Ultimately the blame will be placed on the central govt even though the acts themselves take place because of the negligence (or in some cases, with the active connivance) of various state govts.

2. Even a lame duck government is expected to take law and order decisions. To extend it further, it will also be expected to respond to external aggression. Just because it is lame duck does not mean it does not have law & order or defense or security responsibility or power.

Making constitutional arguments is not going to help when the entire barrage of narrative is manipulated to fully capitalize on peoples' sentiments after mass-scale tragedy, turning them against Modi. If there is still a combustible L&O situation prevailing in many parts of India, moreover, that makes it much harder for the security forces to do their job against a foreign aggressor. It's the old trick of heating up the rear.

Ultimately the plan is to destabilize and undermine the credibility of Modi in a short time-frame through massive manipulation of public sentiment (that will be the INC's window to demand new elections, when public opinion of Modi sarkar is at its unthinking nadir, and before voters can move past what happened to make a more level-headed assessment of things).

[Rudradev]

Rudradev ji,

I have been a big fan of your writing. I tend to agree with above except on point 3 and last para.

Gujarat does not matter to general population that votes for him and those for which it matters are not relevant to him.

As for 3, my worry is that he may declare victory after a certain level of retribution only to find Pakis playing mischief again during election process. Like that dialogue in movie Lakshya, "Pakistani hamesha dobara palat ke ata hai"...

Thanks Shivaji ji. I didn't mean that Gujarat per se mattered (though the entire fabricated anti-Modi narrative from 2002, was the entire reason why he was held back and we had to wait until 2014 instead of 2009 for a Modi sarkar... if he did not have to fight that burden, along with others like the Ishrat Jahan and Sohrabuddin propaganda, he might well have been a contender for PM five years earlier).

The point is that violence (especially spectacular, mass-scale violence) can be used to make people put their immediate feelings over and above their long-term common sense, and vote AGAINST their best interests. All the thinking and regret only come later when we have a khichdi-sarkar (or Gods forbid, Rahul Gandhi as PM).

I take your point about #3... even if Modi DOES retaliate against Pulwama that can be used to say he "poked the hornet's nest" to invite attacks on the election, etc. But I think it will be worse if he does not retaliate, from an optics point of view.


My main message is: please Modi Sarkar, maintain an iron grip on the GE 2019 electoral process, do not relax your vigilance at all, because it is a huge target that is difficult to protect, and things will be disastrous if it is successfully attacked.

[Karan M]

Rudradev, if Modis rallies are attacked in GE2019, there is the possibility of a massive pro Modi wave akin to a sympathy vote or show of rebellion. It might be tactical sewercide from the POV of TSP interests which is par for the course for those idiots.

[Rudradev]

That is true. In fact they tried to bomb his 2014 rally in Bihar but that only worked in his favour.

But I'm even more concerned about the actual polling than the rallies.

[Singha]

raga has roped in gen hooda retd theater commander of northern sector to draft some kind of security policy for his campaign.

[disha]

BTW in a case of fratricide, a paki mujahid pilot fired a missile and shot down his wingman.

Link? Hopefully it was a F16 of Fizzleya.

[Joe Fernandez]

Who the hell is MBS?

Mohammed Bin Salman

[Shameek]

BTW in a case of fratricide, a paki mujahid pilot fired a missile and shot down his wingman.

Link? Hopefully it was a F16 of Fizzleya.

This is an old incident in 1987 against the Soviets.

The F-16's were up against MiG 23s. The theory was that the F-16 leader was shot down by his wingman.

[pankajs]

1. Large scale violence during election means large scale targeting but there are far too many booth to allow for any such possibility.

Really? The more the booths assaulted by local PFI-SIMI (or even Naxal) cells in diverse locations, and the more the "retaliations" carried out by local paid-goonda militias in response, the harder the maintenance of law and order will be. We've seen what happens in WB and Kerala even in normal times... how difficult would it be for much worse to occur in a number of opposition-controlled states, including the recently-Congi heartland? Ultimately the blame will be placed on the central govt even though the acts themselves take place because of the negligence (or in some cases, with the active connivance) of various state govts.

Which was the last election that was hijacked per you? What forces was deployed during that election and what will be deployed during LS elections?

2. Even a lame duck government is expected to take law and order decisions. To extend it further, it will also be expected to respond to external aggression. Just because it is lame duck does not mean it does not have law & order or defense or security responsibility or power.

Making constitutional arguments is not going to help when the entire barrage of narrative is manipulated to fully capitalize on peoples' sentiments after mass-scale tragedy, turning them against Modi. If there is still a combustible L&O situation prevailing in many parts of India, moreover, that makes it much harder for the security forces to do their job against a foreign aggressor. It's the old trick of heating up the rear.

Ultimately the plan is to destabilize and undermine the credibility of Modi in a short time-frame through massive manipulation of public sentiment (that will be the INC's window to demand new elections, when public opinion of Modi sarkar is at its unthinking nadir, and before voters can move past what happened to make a more level-headed assessment of things).

This was your original point

4) In all this chaos there will be no leadership in New Delhi with the wherewithal to strike hard and prosecute a retaliatory war against Pakistan with international diplomatic support... NOTE THE US INTELLIGENCE THREAT ASSESSMENT has ALREADY prepared the ground for a narrative that any violence during GE 2019 will be Modi/BJP's fault, not to be blamed on Pakistan.

1. My point was not about "barrage of narrative" but about you point on "leadership in Delhi .. with the wherewithal .. prosecute a retaliatory war against Pakistan".
2. There will be a government and it will have powers to take decisions both on L&O and external aggression. These are not constitutional arguments but facts of the matter.

On your additional points
3. This point about "combustible L&O situation prevailing in many parts of India, moreover, that makes it much harder for the security forces to do their job against a foreign aggressor" is strange. The states have their own forces along with many central paramilitary forces to deal with L&O. The Army, even in a case like Gujarat riots, should be free to deal with situation on the border unless it is an all out war on both fronts.
4. If it is so easy to "destabilize and undermine the credibility of Modi in a short time-frame" by "old trick of heating up the rear" and border at the same time, why have the forces inimical to India/BJP/Modi waited for so long? I mean it could be done today as easily if it were so easy.

I mean they could undermine him now and wack him in the upcoming election. Why wait for election to create chaos and then force a re-election to wack in the re-election?

[sudhan]

Link? Hopefully it was a F16 of Fizzleya.

This is an old incident in 1987 against the Soviets.

The F-16's were up against MiG 23s. The theory was that the F-16 leader was shot down by his wingman.

Back then there was an aura of invincibility around the solahs. Also the paki solah pilots.

Both their echandees were thoroughly screwed by that incident. Huge cover up went 'phussss'

[nam]

Mush style National broadcast - done.
Jud/LeT re-banning done.
Now Masood and LeT joker will be put in to prison for safe keeping. After that there will be screams of Pak badal gaaya hai from both side of the border. They will made to stay in safety till the election.

Meanwhile, we are letting Pak take the narrative with the usual drama.

[disha]

^Abrogating IWT is one thing and using our own share of water resources is another thing.

India was lacking in infrastructure all over and particularly in J&K, at the same time for 70 years (post partition) we allowed some of our waters to flow into Bakistan. This lever the tactically smart but strategically stupid Bakistanis high on Bakistaniyat never understood.

It should be further noted that constructing a dam is not easy. For example very large dams required India to run to WB and they would play water politics (link -> https://www.outlookindia.com/website/st ... -mo/301819)

Having grown economically, India can now fund those dams itself and has the engineering talent and wherewithal to build in seemingly inaccessible areas. The areas are very seismically active mountainous terrain (of course!)

Further it is not that we are totally devoid of dams there. All governments have been working hard to create necessary infrastructure. Case in point:

India's share of water from Ravi, Beas and Sutlej rivers came to 33 million acres feet (MAF). While about 95 per cent of the water was being used in the country after the construction of three main dams across the rivers, close to 5 per cent water or 1.6 MAF would flow to Pakistan.

Since every drop counts, even 1.6 MAF harnessed will bring atleast 1.2 million acres of land under irrigation (1 feet of water per acre and 0.4 million acre feet for other consumption)

To gain access to this water, India is now building more dams which will be completed in six years, officials said.

In another tweet, Gadkari said, "The construction of dam has started at Shahpur-Kandi on Ravi river. Moreover, UJH project will store our share of water for use in J&K and the balance water will flow from 2nd Ravi-BEAS Link to provide water to other basin states."

And here is an interesting snippet:

For this, a central assistance of Rs 485.38 crore for irrigation component over five years from 2018-19 to 2022-23 was also announced.

In September 2018, the Punjab and the Jammu and Kashmir governments had signed an agreement to resume works on the Rs 2,793-crore Shahpur-Kandi project, according to officials. Though the work on the project began in 2013, it was halted due to certain issues raised by J-K.

Link: https://www.news18.com/news/india/pulwa ... 44455.html

[pankajs]

Narrative is for the gullible. If Modi/Doval are what we think they are they will ask for facts in the ground and not get taken in by narrative.

They will start by asking, to the interlocutor who will come to them with the narrative, why no action has been taken yet on Mumbai case till date. Just on that one question all narrative will collapse.

[Dilbu]

What narrative? They can do as much dramabazi as they want. Not a word has been spoken by GoI. The sword is still being sharpened.

[syam]

I mean they could undermine him now and wack him in the upcoming election. Why wait for election to create chaos and then force a re-election to wack in the re-election?

That's because they want the system to succeed but Modiji to fail. So far our system is pretty much beneficial to our enemies. Why disrupt it when the main problem is one man?

[disha]

Back then there was an aura of invincibility around the solahs. Also the paki solah pilots.

Both their echandees were thoroughly screwed by that incident. Huge cover up went 'phussss'

. Thanks. Will search it out on google. That story of baki valour is upthere to be told along with the other story of Fizzleya's run in with pigs on the tarmac during takeoff!

[pankajs]

I mean they could undermine him now and wack him in the upcoming election. Why wait for election to create chaos and then force a re-election to wack in the re-election?

That's because they want the system to succeed but Modiji to fail. So far our system is pretty much beneficial to our enemies. Why kill it when the main problem is one man?

How will the "system .. succeed but Modiji .. fail", If massive L&O failure DURING election vs massive L&O failure BEFORE elections?

Lets assume, in both case that "massive L&O failure" will lead to massive backlash against Modi and he would be ousted.

[Sumeet]

raga has roped in gen hooda retd theater commander of northern sector to draft some kind of security policy for his campaign.

Didn't the general see INC behavior after surgical strikes asking for proof etc why align yourself with people with dubious motives as far as India's military and security interests are concerned ?

[Bart S]

This tripe is trending on Paki media and similar people are being selectively quoted (actually many of these scum are so far gone that there is no need to be selective either) for propaganda purposes by them.

The fact that this guy was a Supreme Court judge, shows how deep the tentacles of the whole damn system are.

[Karan M]

Bart, what do you expect from the Indian left.

The communists supported China in 1962. Their descendants and fellow travellers have to make their own mark.

[Bart S]

True, the only hope is that with each passing generation the percentage of these deluded folks gets smaller and smaller. In that regard the Pulwama attack seems to have made an unprecedentedly deep impact with quite a few people from all walks of life who would usually not care much about security/strategic matters being seriously riled up and determined that a response to Pakistan is necessary.

[Karan M]

Bart, they wield disproportionate influence and are saboteurs. I was aware of multiple social media groups run by leftists, can be as innocuous as arts groups , handicrafts, food, book reading clubs. In each, the unwritten agenda is/was that the admins and a few fellow travellers constantly shape the worldview of everyone else to the usual talking points, hindus/ nativist traditions are ignorant, superstitious, misogynist and patriarchal. Shame on you and yours. Does a country with such people even deserve to be proud? Be ashamed of your heritage, constantly suck up to the oppressed ie TSP etc. Terrorists hit you because they were oppressed (insert reason). Your army are murderous exploiters of the rural poor. Missionaries can take lessons from these guys in terms of constant effort, they just dont stop. In industrial zones, in rural areas under the guise of social inclusion, they fan the flames of caste and religious divide, picking sides. They have hit several critical projects. Unfortunately, Modi ignored these jokers completely and it's a huge national security issue. And many of your peers would likely be indoctrinated as well because if you stand up and Express outrage by that time, many have become fence sitters. To my mind, they are a bigger natsec threat than any Islamist or external threat, because they are destroying the Indian state from within.

[Karan M]

Poor man. Sincere, means well and is reasonably apolitical- at least in this interview. Will be used for PR and then his work thrown into the dustbin.
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/video/- ... 2019-02-21

[viveks]

Its really interesting the way governments try to communicate with one another....


https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/wor ... 104050.cms

[Rudradev]

Really? The more the booths assaulted by local PFI-SIMI (or even Naxal) cells in diverse locations, and the more the "retaliations" carried out by local paid-goonda militias in response, the harder the maintenance of law and order will be. We've seen what happens in WB and Kerala even in normal times... how difficult would it be for much worse to occur in a number of opposition-controlled states, including the recently-Congi heartland? Ultimately the blame will be placed on the central govt even though the acts themselves take place because of the negligence (or in some cases, with the active connivance) of various state govts.

Which was the last election that was hijacked per you? What forces was deployed during that election and what will be deployed during LS elections?

https://factly.in/how-is-the-security-d ... ions-made/

CAPFs are deployed at various booths during LS elections. From the link, you can see that their functions mostly revolve around monitoring activities within the booth itself (stopping malpractice, rigging etc.) Not dealing with the spectre of VBIEDs racing towards crowds of people lined up outside the booth. Moreover there are only limited numbers of CAPF to deploy; they depend very much on facilitation by the hosting State Govts to get where they need to go (and when); and the State Govts know in advance how the strength of CAPF personnel at various booths in the state will be distributed.

All useful things for someone planning LS election violence (not booth capturing, but mass-casualty terrorist violence) in cahoots with a State Govt.

Making constitutional arguments is not going to help when the entire barrage of narrative is manipulated to fully capitalize on peoples' sentiments after mass-scale tragedy, turning them against Modi. If there is still a combustible L&O situation prevailing in many parts of India, moreover, that makes it much harder for the security forces to do their job against a foreign aggressor. It's the old trick of heating up the rear.

Ultimately the plan is to destabilize and undermine the credibility of Modi in a short time-frame through massive manipulation of public sentiment (that will be the INC's window to demand new elections, when public opinion of Modi sarkar is at its unthinking nadir, and before voters can move past what happened to make a more level-headed assessment of things).

This was your original point

4) In all this chaos there will be no leadership in New Delhi with the wherewithal to strike hard and prosecute a retaliatory war against Pakistan with international diplomatic support... NOTE THE US INTELLIGENCE THREAT ASSESSMENT has ALREADY prepared the ground for a narrative that any violence during GE 2019 will be Modi/BJP's fault, not to be blamed on Pakistan.

1. My point was not about "barrage of narrative" but about you point on "leadership in Delhi .. with the wherewithal .. prosecute a retaliatory war against Pakistan".
2. There will be a government and it will have powers to take decisions both on L&O and external aggression. These are not constitutional arguments but facts of the matter.

That’s precisely what I mean by a constitutional argument. Of course there will be a “leadership” in New Delhi under the terms of the constitution. But its legitimacy will be severely undermined should the kind of violence described take place on a widespread scale during GE 2019. Anything the govt does at that time will be called into question by exactly the barrage of narrative I am talking about.

If a large % of voters (some of whom lost acquaintances, friends, family members in the violence) is fed sustained misinformation that Modi/BJP themselves engineered the attacks/ensuing communal violence in order to fend off “inevitable defeat” in the elections, do you not expect this will have an impact on (a) the quantum of public confidence in Modi when he identifies Pakistan as the culprit and seeks to retaliate (b) the likely disposition of votes when a replacement election is called? All this WILL constrain the options available to Modi Sarkar at that time, as opposed to any other time.

Don’t forget what I said about international diplomatic support either. If election-related violence happens, it’s already been anticipated in official US govt documents as the fault of the Modi government. Meaning, whoever might have supported an Indian retaliation based on our identification of Pakistan as the culprit in normal times, is going to be given pause (if not reverse their position) when such an attack happens DURING the election. They are also going to hedge their bets a lot further if they see Modi’s continuance in leadership as shaky rather than (as at present) stable.

The two narratives, external skepticism and internal finger-pointing, will in addition be mutually reinforcing in a highly detrimental way. I don’t think you see the implication of staging such violent terrorist attacks during the election itself, as opposed to any other time, but more on that later.

On your additional points
3. This point about "combustible L&O situation prevailing in many parts of India, moreover, that makes it much harder for the security forces to do their job against a foreign aggressor" is strange. The states have their own forces along with many central paramilitary forces to deal with L&O. The Army, even in a case like Gujarat riots, should be free to deal with situation on the border unless it is an all out war on both fronts.
4. If it is so easy to "destabilize and undermine the credibility of Modi in a short time-frame" by "old trick of heating up the rear" and border at the same time, why have the forces inimical to India/BJP/Modi waited for so long? I mean it could be done today as easily if it were so easy.

Ironically, the Gujarat riots are the best case study we have for this. I refer you to Madhu Kishwar’s “Modinama” articles for a detailed account of what happened then. https://www.slideshare.net/ayepee99/modinama

But in short it was this:
a) Muslim terrorists (who were also Congress corporators) staged the attack and massacre of the Sabarmati Express passengers in Godhra on 27 Feb 2002.
b) On the 28th, Modi saw that despite his best efforts at maintaining L&O (detailed in Chapter 2 of Modinama), retaliatory riots were intensifying in Ahmedabad and elsewhere, and might quickly go beyond the capacity of his state police forces to contain.
c) Modi asked for help from the central govt as well as from the state govts of neighbouring states: Cong-ruled Maharashtra, Cong-ruled MP, Cong-ruled Rajasthan to send some of their state police forces for maintenance of order.
d) Only the Maharashtra govt sent a few detachments of State Police; MP (Digvijay Singh) and RJ (Ashok Gehlot) refused. The situation became more dire.
e) George Fernandes (RM) arrived in Ahmedabad by the evening of 28th Feb. However the nearest army units could not be withdrawn from the Indo-Pak border in Gujarat during Op Parakram (see what I mean by “heating up the rear?”) and hence other army detachments had to be brought in from other states.
f) Only on the 1st of March did the army presence become sufficient to quell the riots.

Despite doing ALL the right things, the combination of an external threat at Pakistan border and internal violence instigated by Congress + Pakistan was very nearly devastating to Modi. For this he was tainted with the “Maut Ka Saudaagar” label.

Misinformation and Narrative spreading were RAMPANT: many secular voices were saying “How come he didn’t do anything to stop massacre of Muslims from 3 days, from 28th to 1st?” …. conveniently obscuring the fact that February has only 28 days!!

Despite being cleared of any wrongdoing by the Supreme Court SIT, Modi was dogged by the spectre of 2002 for the next twelve years. It is still being used to malign him internationally today.

Finally, it is well known that the nightmare scenario prototyped at Godhra-Ahmedabad 2002 was a major factor in Vajpayee’s ultimate decision to end the Parakram deployment and return the troops from border deployments with no action taken… after all the talk of aar-paar ki ladai. Even we on BRF haven’t entirely forgiven Vajpayee for this.

So there is a big difference between saying the army “should be free” to do this and that, and what actually happens in these situations. Even on a local scale like Gujarat 2002.

Imagine if that were repeated with even partial success at many different locations across the country.

Also, imagine it happening NOW (as opposed to 2002) in an era when hysteria, misinformation, and rumors can be spread virally through social media.

I mean they could undermine him now and wack him in the upcoming election. Why wait for election to create chaos and then force a re-election to wack in the re-election?

Because of the following factors:

1) Domestic Political Climate: In normal times like this past week, when there is an attack and Pakistan seems responsible, the political parties (even Congress and MGB types) are severely constrained in how much they can openly go against the PM. They have to stand with the armed forces, hence the govt, hence the PM’s leadership by implication.

BUT during an election itself, they will have far more latitude to cry foul and allege malpractice by the govt trying to “steal the election”. Do you think the original architects of “Maut ka Saudaagar”, “26/11= Hindu Terrorism”, “Rafale Deal Was a Scam” etc. will hesitate for a moment to do this?

This goes for the public as well… common citizens will unite behind Modi & take a hard line against Pakistan when incidents like Uri or Pulwama happen, but during election season, the Public Mood is far more partisan and people’s sentiments are strongly vested in supporting political parties of their choice. When an election is on for the next Lok Sabha, a good portion of the people no longer perceive the previous PM’s leadership as a fact of ongoing life… they see it as the end of an era and the beginning of a new one in which potentially a new PM might be in charge. This makes them less likely to unquestioningly accept the authority of the pre-election government across the board; and hence, more susceptible to the propaganda that GE 2019 violence is either a deliberate ploy by Modi to win re-election, OR an unforgivable act of incompetence that must be punished at the polls.

Not all or even most people will feel this way; but if a critical mass of people in the right constituencies can be swayed in this direction, it will have an impact on the PM’s support in the new (replacement) election. Modi may or may not be able to negate and reverse that impact, but doing so will depend a lot on how he manages the situation with respect to retaliating against Pakistan. And, as Gujarat 2002 shows, retaliation will become that much harder because Pakistan has heated up the rear.

2) International Climate: today, Trump, MBS, Putin, Macron, Ghani, Rouhani are all making neutral-to-supportive sounds at the prospect of Modi retaliating against Pakistan for Pulwama. All countries did exactly nothing to deter the surgical strike for that matter. That was because Modi was, and is, the sitting PM of a country.

For them, too, Modi being a caretaker PM while elections are in progress changes things. Note that IEDs have already been placed in the Threat Assessment from US Intelligence regarding BJP/Modi culpability for any violence that takes place during GE 2019 (I keep coming back to this, because I cannot imagine why else it would be mentioned in such a report… and we cannot afford to ignore it as a warning sign). Even beyond that, other countries will smell the possibility of Modi being either greatly weakened during a replacement election, or failing to return as PM. This will make them far less likely to back any initiative he takes to retaliate against Pakistan. Not only that, hostile leaders like Xi Jingping (who for now is sitting quietly in the Pulwama aftermath) might go on the offensive diplomatically to undercut international support for India, as well as maneuver the PLA in a deterrent posture, if he senses that Modi’s cachet among world leaders has declined.

Remember, a LOT of regimes internationally might prefer that Modi not return in 2019. For the time being they are resigned to his leadership of India, and they deal with him in consonance with their strategic and diplomatic relationship to India. When there is blood in the water, things change.