In the wake of blasts

It angers me to see bomb blasts in Bangalore and Ahmedabad. Make no mistake, 8 bomb blasts in Bangalore and 17 in Ahmedabad represent colossal intelligence failure. There are so many shortcomings that are way too obvious. We don't have coordination between centre and state. This was made clear even in IISC shooting in Bangalore few years back. There is no central database that can track individuals with known criminal background. Even the police stations are horribly low tech. Just for example say a child gets lost in a city like Delhi, the poor parents can file a missing report. Now imagine, a few months later someone reports the same kid to some other police station, say in Gurgaon. Do you think, the child can ever make back to his parents? Now just imagine had this been computerized. A database that can record reports for missing children, and children who get reported. The possibilitis are amazing, right?

Still in a country where the funds never make to the ground level, such ideas remain a distant dream. Sometimes I feel like quitting whatever I am working on and heading back to India to implement such ideas. Then I am reminded of the politics and my horrid experience in police stations. Maybe someday I can rid myself of all the -ve fears and do something good for my country.

But I AM proud of how no communal violence broke out in Bangalore and Ahmedabad. It is easy for people like me who are sitting thousands of miles away to lecture that there should be no communal violence as that is exactly what the terrorists want. It is quite another thing for someone who has just lost some loved one. I applaud their courage. And I applaud the police and the army who kept extremist hindu/muslim outfits in control. I was surprised by the very sensible statement by Shivraj Patil. He was right on when he offered full help to Gujarat govt and refused to blame them for the failure to prevent attacks. Same cannot be said of the statements by Advani and Rajnath, who are bent on using the attacks to their political advantage. Shame on them. If they can remember, Karil war happened during their regime.

I pray for all those whose loved ones got killed/injured in these horrific attacks. I also hope Indian govt takes steps to improve its intelligence gathering. Centralization and computerization is the key. It is high time we went high tech on the war against terror.