Telling an old tale

PUBLIC memory is often short, and David Headley's deposition has only reconfirmed India's delusion as pacific justice-seeker.  

What Headley in his deposition to a Mumbai special court was essentially that Hafeez Sayeed, ISI, and Pakistani army are essentially one entity. That the Pakistani army owns and commands Pakistan is now a gospel truth, needing no further substantiation. Yet, nations where rule of law and democracy prevail have not yet brought themselves to such mental fortitude to react proportionately in deeds as meted out by the rogue countries. And, alas, India stays the same deeply pacific nation.

David Coleman Headley, an American with Pakistani origin, made the deposition through video-conferencing to the Mumbai court, after his plea for pardon was accepted in exchange of becoming an approver. He is in an American jail, and has thoroughly been interrogated there and whose details had been shared with India long back. And what Headley had told his American interrogators formed part of the Indian dossiers to Pakistan on 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.

Thus, Headley only re-confirmed what he has already revealed, that he had been a Lashkar-e-Taiba operative and had been given training under the supervision of ISI through Major Mir, Major Ali, and Major Iqbal. His training was oversaw by Hafeez Sayeed. 

That Pakistan is a democratic country is known well to be a farce enacted by her army to create a facade and escape being branded North Korea of the South Asia. Headley told the court that the former Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani attended the funeral of his father. Gillani is the immediate predecessor of current Pak PM Nawaz Sharif. 

The 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks was arguably the most dastardly. Hundreds were killed, taken hostage, raped and even sodomized. The video footage seen by scribes covering intelligence agencies are too gut-wrenching. Despite all evidences, the world has shown deafening silence on crime against humanity in which nationals of the US, UK, Israel too met the fates of those Indians stuck in the Taj on the fateful night. 

There are enough hints to suggest that Headley was made an approver under plea bargain in an act whose ownership lies with the National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval. Headley named Ishrat Jahan, who was killed in an encounter and later riled the human rights campaigners for long, as a mole of the LeT. That must have been a cause of relief to the BJP chief Amit Shah, who had been dragged into the "fake" encounter.

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh shunned his emotional longings to visit his ancestral Gah village in the Punjab province of Pakistan to stay the course to keep talks with the neighbour in an abeyance until perpetrators of 26/11 were brought to face justice. He arguably withstood all pressure to initiate formal talks with Pakistan.

BUT the 2014 Indian mandate was grand in scale, and intoxicated the winner with idea of grandstanding. So, PM Narendra Modi showcased his "vision" and had Nawaz Sharif as his most favoured guest on the occasion of swearing in ceremony. A little over a year later an Indian Prime Minister landed on Pakistani soil. But none of the perpetrators of the 26/11 had faced justice.

Not only India but the US too are guilty of having forgotten the 26/11 and its hundreds of victims. The US clamps sanctions against nations most often at its whims and fancies. The US crippled Myanmar, Iran, Russia, and others with its weapon of sanctions. Myanmar and Iran toed the American lines to get out of the sanctions.

Headley has told loud and clear that the mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks were not stateless actors but Pakistan herself. He has shared enough evidences to implicate the Pakistani army, which incidentally is the owner, lord, and the only law of Pakistan. 

The US would serve humanity a great service by proclaiming Pakistan as a rogue state and her army a terror militia. The time has come and justice demands that the US imposes a crippling sanctions against Pakistan.