Avoiding Provocations

There is more than just a grain of good sense in what former Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah said on Thursday about avoiding provocative statements on the action taken by the Centre against attacks on our military installations by Pakistan. He blamed such statements by the Centre for the recent attacks on military installations in Jammu & Kashmir. “We are paying the price for the statements made after the (September 29) surgical strikes (on militant launchpads in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir). Had our rulers remained silent after the surgical strikes and done the talking through their deeds, not words, perhaps the situation would have been different... They (the Centre) challenged Pakistan and said Pakistan would not dare to even look at India after the surgical strikes... Then after demonetization, they said they had crushed terrorism. Their words are now proving to be wide of the mark,” said Omar Abdullah. He added that if the Defence Minister of India made statements like India would “gouge out the eyes” of enemies if provoked, there would obviously be a reaction to it somewhere. “It is regrettable that there are attacks one after the other on our establishments, whether it is in grota, Samba or in any other place,” he added. He requested people at the helm to concentrate on their work and leave the talking to the Opposition.

It is hardly surprising that the remarks of Omar Abdullah should have triggered off an uproar in Jammu & Kashmir. The BJP youth president in Jammu & Kashmir, Ravindra Rai, accused Omar of “batting for Pakistan” instead of  criticising Pakistan for its militant attacks. He said that it was Pakistan that was creating problems, not India. He referred to Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s invitation to then Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf for talks, after which there was an attack on our Parliament. He also referred to Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Pakistan after which there were the terror attacks in Pathankot and Uri.

While there is no denying the ceaseless belligerence of Pakistan, there is also the need to realize that statements about what India was going to do to Pakistan are both provocative and puerile. The need of the hour is to do what needs to be done efficiently and mercilessly without indulging in any kind of superfluous verbosity. What needs to be appreciated is that there is greater respect for any country that is capable of delivering what it needs to without any needless talk. There is a certain sense of fility in such action because there is grace in such action. In the present case, the need of the hour is military action. This military action needs to be carried out without any further recourse to verbosity. Those at the helm of affairs must resolve that henceforth there will be no superfluous recourse to colourful verbal threats that are totally ineffective even though they can be very provocative in prompting retaliatory action by a country that has chosen to make belligerence to India its foremost objective—far ahead of its goals of development.

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