Part of the problem as I see it is that India's Establishment (including its main Opposition party) has chosen to garb its concerns and preoccupations in the language of religiosity. Masjids, conversions, whatever. You can't blame the international media -- at least here -- when they go for the rational arguments (even if they come from Pakistan) over the emotional ones that may continue to fool the Indian electorate, but hardly bring in any solutions to long-term problems. Nor make much sense to any rational person.
2008/11/29 Rajan P. Parrikar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Then there was Ms Zain Verjee, the CNN International > anchor and a muslim, who did not let a single opportunity > go without telling Americans how disaffected the Indian > muslim youth are in India and how opportunities for India's > muslims are slim. Nobody talks about India's Hindu > poor (600+ million) and their travails. I guess Hindus > don't count since we are "secular." India is also into large-scale denial about how deeply all the politics-of-hate and communalism that have got legitimacy in Indian discourse (including from sections within the Congress, see some of the policies of the Digambar Kamat government, for instance) have helped make possible the tragedy that today is South Bombay. Btw, would we all be shedding as many tears if the people affected were not the richest in the most fashionable addresses of Mumbai? The 'politics of response' is also interesting. FN
