Sombre Sunday: City marches for peace

NEW DELHI: While the general mood across the country seems to have turned against politicians and questions are being raised about the state's attempt to tackle terror, participants at a silent public meeting at Jantar Mantar pledged to assist the government and put the country back on track. No slogans were raised, nor were there any placards on display.Instead, it was the start of a silent movement by 70 odd men and women from the Doon School Old Boys' Society (DSOBS) and old students of Welham Girls' High School, all dressed in black. The movement, they dream, will help make India a safer and better country.
Ankur Bahl, a 1976 batch alumni of Doon School and one of the organisers of the meeting, said, "It's shameful to have woken up now only when people like us have been hit. We should have started our fight against terrorism right after the 1993 attack. Nevertheless, better late than never.''
Addressing the meeting, Bahl added, "Let our message of helping the civic bodies and security agencies spread like a friendly virus. And when that happens, we will succeed in establishing a shadow government within our own structure that will help in revamping the system.''
The protest corner of the Capital, Jantar Mantar, in fact witnessed a couple of peace marches on Sunday. One of them was organised by Muslim groups which condemned terrorism in the strongest possible words. Kamal Faruqui, chairman, Delhi Minorities Commission, said, "We want to spread our message across the globe that an Indian Muslim is equally hurt after the terror attacks as any other Indian.'' Reinforcing his statement, he added, "Indian Muslims have nothing to do with terrorism. But if there is any Muslim organisation that breeds terror, we declare them un-Islamic.''
Members of Jamiat Ulama-I-Hind, along with other community leaders from various NGOs, organized the peace march at 12 different cities of India including Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Mumbai , all of which have been wounded by terror attacks this year. The placards that dotted the march had strong messages like `Terrorists are enemies of Islam' and `Do not blemish Jihad'.
Not far from Jantar Mantar at the India Gate lawns, a newly formed social organization All India People's Protection Society (AIPPS) paid homage to the Mumbai terror attack victims. The group, with most of its members being young entrepreneurs, was seemingly busy looking for answers to the questions in the mind of every Indian today How to bring about a change in the system?
Suniti Wadhwa, chief coordinator of AIPPS, said, "We know our effort to improve the system needs to be sustained for years. But we don't mind. After all, for how long can we (Indians) continue to live under such complete systemic failure where terror attacks have become a part of life.''
Nothing could better sum up the emotions at the India Gate lawns than the placard held by a mother, with her seven-month-old boy in her arms, saying "I don't know what you say or do, I don't know how to say or do. All I need is a safer tomorrow.''