IBNlive Chat: Has India learnt to live with terror?

A year after the 7/11 Mumbai blasts, terror lives on in our lives. Why have terror attacks become so common in India? Has India learnt to live with terror? That was the topic of discussion in the IBNLive chatroom on Wednesday, July 11, when V K Shashikumar, Editor, CNN-IBN Special Investigations, fielded readers' queries from across the spectrum in a live chat running into an hour.

Here we reproduce the entire chat with no editorial touch at all:

Ashish Mehta: There is a thin dividing line countering terrorism and violating human rights. What could be the best practices to handle this?

V K Shashikumar: Yes, there is a thin line between active counter terrorism and violating human rights. But pro-active counter terrorism means that an agency develops accurate information on a terror suspect and does not move in till such time that they are sure about a potential suspect immediate intention or intentions.

Navin: Do you think Manmohan Singh or Sonia Gandhi would ever approve operation like Lal Masjid in India even if Osama or Dawood were holed up inside? We don't have guts to crush the militancy.

V K Shashikumar: Militancy cannot be crushed by brute force alone.

Nandu: Now a days many journalists are coming forward and are many steps ahead of the police men in investigation of many cases dont u think that it is going to reduce the moral of the police.

V K Shashikumar: We live in a democratic country and every citizen has the right to stand up and make his or her point.

Akshay: Has the Mumbai police evolved new techniques in investigating a terror activity?

V K Shashikumar: The Indian police forces have a long way to go in investigation terrorist attacks. But a beginning seems to have been made. But these are rudimentary steps. Indian police forces have to get out of law and order mindset and get into active counter terror operations.

Santanu: Sir, I remember once your team covered Northeast extensively. But unfortunately, when the region is burning now, CNN-IBN has nothing on it? You guys seem to be too south centric? Why this discrimination?

V K Shashikumar: Yes. After the hidden wars series we haven't brought back focus on the region. It’s an issue we will try to address soon.

Shamit: I’ve done a couple of stories on Drug Pedalling in Pune, but how is it that drugs help in funding terror activities ?

V K Shashikumar: Narco-terrorism, that’s what it’s called. It is fairly well established. The ISI was the direct beneficiary of this. How else could the ISI have raised money to support terrorist groups operating in Kashmir?

Mansi Jhaveri: Sir, are we going to sit and console our near and dear ones when such tragedies strike? Is this the only thing left to do,or we have the power to fight back this cruel act?

V K Shashikumar: Of course, we should fight back and fight back hard. That is what I have been saying. We need a zero tolerance policy on fighting terrorism. At the same time we must ensure that our terrorism policy does not stigmatise any community. And there are effective ways of doing that. Look the chargesheet in the Mumbai blasts clearly says that Rs 15 lakh was sent over four years to stage the attack. If the Mumbai police beat constable system was in place and it was alive and kicking, a beat constable would have known that such and such place has been hired by strangers who have recently moved in. What does a beat constable do? He patrols a particular area. Every police station in the country has beat constables who are supposed to know their areas or beats like the back of their hand. They are supposed to know who comes in and who goes out. To know this they must be welded to the community. They must get the trust of the community in which they have the beat. If this had happened. if our policing is pro-active, you can sure that somebody from the area of Faisal Sheikh's residence would have reported suspicious activity and the police could have cracked the case open even before the terrorist struck. But that did not happen. And will not happen as long as there is corruption in the police forces. And as long as there is no alert citizenry.

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Satish Vinjamuri: What is the role madrasas? They are always in spotlight whenever there is a terror attack.

V K Shashikumar: Madrasas must be modernised. There are no two ways about it. Illiterate religious preachers cannot be allowed to influence young minds in divisive and hate politics. Madrasas are also places of learning and it must not become breeding grounds for brainwashing young people into terrorist ideologies.

Vikas Malik: Sir, 90 per cent conflicts going on in India are due to Muslims. Be it Israel, Iraq, Iran, PoK, Chechen. Whenever there’s any attack, I hear a Muslim name. I know that all Muslims are not bad but there must be something that’s causing the unrest.

V K Shashikumar: Israel: because the land of Palestinians was taken away and they want a country of their own and the Western world still refuses to amicably settle the issues. The frustration of Palestinians is today manifested in the Hamas Iraq--was invaded by the US led coalition forces and now we know they had no business to intervene in another country because Saddam was not really developing any WMDs.

PoK because Pakistan considers the 1947 partition incomplete and so started a terrorist movement helped in large measure by despicable failures of Governance by India in Jammu and Kashmir.

Chechen: Because this small enclave within Russia wants autonomy and the Russians are not willing to consider that. So?

Vikas Malik: My question for you is that most of the terror attacks today are being carried out by Muslims be it 9/11 or 7/11from Parliament attack. It is not only illetrate people who do these type of attacks but recent attack on glasow airport has shown engineers and doctors too have done it...master mind of parliament attack was proffesor of delhi university....what do u think is the reason that s motivating muslims to take the path of violence

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V K Shashikumar: 9/11 was carried out by Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda. Osama was against US intervention in the middle east. He had a long list of grievances against US. Incidentally, there is enough publicly available material and admissions by senior US government officials that Osama was once upon a time a beneficiary of the cold war politics when the world was divided into two ideological camps led by the US and the former Soviet Union. Osama was a key element of US training of Mujahideens in Afghanistan to take on the Najibullah government. History boomeranged in such a manner that a stooge of the CIA became its biggest enemy. The Parliament attack was carried out by terrorists belonging to a terrorist group functioning out of Paksitan. Pakistan supports terrorism because it wants to keep bleeding India in a low level conflict, apart from its territorial ambitions in Kashmir. Yes in both cases the terrorists happen to be Muslims. Thats where the similarity ends. It just happens that both sets of attacks were carried out by Muslims. How many people are dying in Sri Lanka because of the repeated attacks by the Hindu terrorist outfit called LTTE?

Angel: Can I have your email id? I have many more questions than this chat can take!

V K Shashikumar: Anyone who has investigative leads do feel free to send it to [email protected]

Kaushik: Do you consider India as a very soft state in tackling terror and in particular terrorists?

V K Shashikumar: Terrorism requires an unified policy. And it is neither soft or hard. It has to do with protecting the country's national interests. What are our national interests? Our national interest is that we continue to be a democratic, progressive country. That we maintain communal harmony and allow every citizen an opportunity to grow, progress and create wealth. That we maintain our economic growth rate and over the next few decades become a first world advanced nation. That we protect our liberal and multi-cultural and multi-religious values. That we are always in a position to defend our borders and our people. These are our national interests and the aim of terrorists is to destroy our common heritage and our common future. They want to steal our past and our future. So there is only one and there can be only one policy when it comes to dealing with terrorism. That we do not allow terrorists to harm our national interests.

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Anchal: Dear Shashi, what do you think about the manner in which muslims are picked up and targetted?

V K Shashikumar: I was about to answer a similar question when I spotted this and I chose to answer this because this is direct and relevant to our times. There have been cases of Muslims being picked up and targetted. Targetted in the sense that they feel a sense of being always under the scanner and looked at suspiciously. There are 160 Million Muslims in India. My mother's neighbour in Kerala is Muslim and this family has nothing in common with a Muslim in UP and both of them have nothing in common with a Muslim in the East. Muslims are not a monolithic entity and there are as many kinds of Muslims in this country as there are Hindus. There are as many Islamic traditions and way of living as there are among Hindus. So what is the fuss about? A LTTE Hindu terrorist killed an Indian Prime Minister. Did we say all Hindus are terrorists? By that same logic the actions of some cannot be used to brand an entire community. Plus there is nothing like a monolithic Muslim Brotherhood. It is a figment of imagination. The fight between Shias and Sunnis is bloody and fierce. What’s happening in Iraq? There is terrorism directed against the US-UK led coalition forces. And there is also terrorism against by the Sunni terror outfits against the Shias outfits and vice versa.

Varun: Do you believe that our intelligence agencies are capable of tackling terror?

V K Shashikumar: Yes.

Raviraj: Terrorism or Proxy war is much more costly and difficult to deal with than even an actual war? Yet as a country we continue to be soft on our neighbours. What do you think?

V K Shashikumar: When it comes to terrorism and protecting the national interest the country should have a tough policy. Zero tolerance for terrorism and violence.

Amit srivastava: It seems sometime that the politician shield the criminals and terrorist to fullfill their own interest which puts nations in danger. Don't u think that there is need to strengthen the investigative journalism by involving more and more numbers of the people with the help of Information Technology tools so that we as a people of India could be involve in the strengthening of the our own country interest and give future generations a bright and fearless future.

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V K Shashikumar: Yes. Absolutely. CNN-IBN has pioneered citizen journalism where citizens report on pressing issues. If you have any investigation leads or ideas send it to [email protected]

Santanu: Hi, congrats for your latest investigation on hawala money? Western Union is a very popular and renowned group. I just can't believe they would be involved in all this? How sure are you about your findings?

V K Shashikumar: I think you got the investigation wrong. Our investigation does not say Western Union is doing any wrongdoing. What we found out was Western Union Agents. People who have been given the western union franchise are doing Hawala transactions.

Zahoor: Sir, don’t you feel we need to be more tough with these kind of elements before they strike we are ready to hit them hard?

V K Shashikumar: That is why the rationale of effective intelligence. The ability to hit 'them' (terrorists) before they hit innocent targets can only be developed when the country's law enforcement agencies develops high levels of counter-terrorism expertise. In counter-terrorism intelligence agencies penetrate terrorist groups and they develop the ability to pick up electronic evidence. They develop strategies to figure out potential terror suspects and their movements and then hit them hard. In the last 10 months many big terror plots of the al-Queda has been smashed because of superb counter terror abilities of western intelligence agencies, for instance the plot to blow of 10 trans Atlantic flights was detected and eliminated just in the nick of time.

Vidya: Guess we should unlearn the idea of living with terror. We have been living with it ever since the Indian independance. It is time now we learn to fight terror and get rid of it. Why fear in a free country?

V K Shashikumar: Yes, we live in a free country and that is why it is critically important to not fall prey to either the terror that the terrorists want to spread or the divisive ideology they propagate. The best way to defeat the objectives of a terrorist or a terrorist group is to ensure that we transform ourselves into an alert citizenry. That we help the law enforcement agencies. From doing simple things like reporting suspicious strangers who have recently moved into your neighbourhood to reporting suspicious objects lying in public places. There is a whole lot of stuff that we as citizens can do to defeat terrorism.

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Alok: We have the best police officers, the best CBI but none of the suspects has been arrested for the 7/11 Mumbai blast. Why?

V K Shashikumar: Because most of the terror against is directed and controlled from non-state actors beyond India's borders. It has been fairly well established that Pakistan's inter services intelligence continues to support terrorist outfits based in Pakistan and whose principal aim is to spread terror in India. That is why it becomes difficult to completely close terror investigations in India. Besides, there is a solid case for improving the intelligence set up in the country. A set up that should not merely be reactive but instead generate pro-active intelligence on terror suspects and what they are planning to do. There should be full-scale intelligence infrastructure from solid and painstakingly collated human intelligence from ground to a variety of electronic intelligence and finally as the recently enunciated draft on police reforms suggests law and order function of the police should be completely de-linked from crime investigations. A dedicated federal agency that goes into terror related crimes would be effective in pulling in resources from a host of agencies

Atulalvenkar: What is your opinion on hanging of Afzal Guru ?

V K Shashikumar: I am not sure about Afzal Guru because I am not sure whether all the facts pertaining to his case have been presented and scrutinised in a fair manner.

Angel: What does financing terror mean? I am a little lost.

V K Shashikumar: Those who generate and circulate money to set up terrorist infrastructure to train terrorists, those who actually fund terrorists to go to a certain place set up base and prepare for a terror strike are terror funders. Financing of terrorism is a complex business because it tries to circumvent the international financial system in a very sophisticated manner so that it becomes very difficult to detect who is sending money to whom for what kind of terror attack but when actionable intelligence is married to accurate financial intelligence, terror plots can be broken and unearthed as has happened in the recent past.

Sridharan: Why would always Goverment/Police do the Post-Modem? It says India still not ready to tackle the terror.

V K Shashikumar: A lot has to be done to tackle terror. 21st century terrorism is different from the kind of terrorism India has faced in the late 1980s and 1990s.

Thanks everyone for joining this chat. There were too many questions. I could not respond to all of them. Terrorism itself is a big issue and all aspects can be covered in a one-hour chat. But yes, we can meet again in this platform and discuss similar issues again sometime soon. Thanks.