Varanasi Blast: Another inteliigence failure?

It had been 10 long months of peace before  on 7 Dec 2010 the Varanasi blast shattered it. The Blast was not a very powerful blast and neither  the bomb had any sharpnels in it.Nonetheless it was an attack on India and its citizens. Varanasi, a prominent Hindu worship place, has been made target before also. The last blast claimed the lives of 2 people and injured 35 others.This blast killed a 2 year old girl and injured 65 others.

While expressing solidarity with the victims, there are also noises made from quarters about intelligence failure.The Center and the State Governments have started quarreling over intelligence provided. Each blaming it on the other.

The question of intelligence failure is something we should look at carefully.Every time there is terrorist attack people start shouting about intelligence failure.How much truth is there in these accusations? We really need to examine that.

For example, the Kargil war was also said to be a big intelligence failure.But latter it was found out that RAW (Research and Analysis Wing ), the external agency of  India, has in fact given such a warning back in 1998.It has warned of Kargil like infiltration int he Northern J&K sector. Surprisingly the Indian Army's Northern Command ignored this warning. According to the generals nobody could survive in such cold. Amusing it is.Did our generals forget about Russian army which stays in Siberia???? OR did our generals forget then that our soldiers are deployed in  Siachen for more than 10 years in similar conditions. I don't think so. Still every body was shouting about intelligence failure. The reason, it got heat off them for the time being.

One must remember that the intelligence agencies in India have no public relations part unlike in America.They live in anonymous world, which is both of advantage and disadvantage.The people responsible knows that nobody from intelligence will refute their claims of intelligence failure and they can blame it on them and get off the hook.In the Kargil war this is what exactly happened.Not a single general was punished for negligence which claimed life of our 463 brave men.

It seems it has become a trend in India to blame intelligence agencies and deflect the blame onto them. The Indian public should start asking question as to why there is every time intelligence failure?Who are the real culprits?Are they the intelligence agencies every time?or are they some officials who comfortably hide behind the veil of intelligence failure?

In the Varanasi blast also it seems the  warning was passed to the UP police but police did not sanitize the area properly. The UP police claims that the intelligence was not specific. My question is how specific can intelligence get?Do UP police thinks that they will be told the exact time, location and names of the person who are going to do it?Don't they want to do a little investigation themselves? It seems our police have been reduced to security guards who just provide security to VVIPs and VIPs.

It's time we ask the government to do proper investigation and find out the real culprits.It's not only the ministers but also the babus and officials which stay insulated from all these.

The Varanasi blast may not have killed many but such incidents are waiting to happen if we do not pull up our socks now.It time to stop blaming intelligence agencies.It's time for introspection.It's time that we do some serious policing.The fight against terrorism can not be fought by the intelligence agencies alone. We need to fight it at all levels.The police and the common people also need to join the fight.We can't  be careless any more.We can't ignore our duty as citizen.Ask yourself , how many times have you reported any abandoned bag to the police?How many times have you asked questions to people who act suspiciously?We just try to get away from such responsibilities thinking it's not our problem.

I don't think a terrorist attack is intelligence failure or police failure alone.It's a collective failure. It's not a failure of a certain department of GOI but it's the nation as whole which have failed.India has failed.We Indians have failed.So it's time we stop blaming and start working towards a better India.

Lastly, my heart goes out to Sanjay kumar's family who lost their only 2 year daughter in his barbaric act.May she rest in peace. I also like to remind all Indians we could be next.Lets start being responsible from today.