People in Mumbai took the trains to work the next day after 7/11 because they have no other choice. They have families to feed, debts to repay, and lives to live. The government, on the other hand, will act busy and concerned for a few days, announce paltry compensation packages, and then go back to the orgy of corruption, treason, vote bank politics, and resign to complete ignonimity.

If this spectacle of blood and gore cannot wake up the Indian nation, then nothing can. The government must resolve to go in for pre-emptive strikes across the border instead of pleading to our inimical neighbor to shut down the terrorist camps. It’s like asking a Hyena to give up preying on dead carcasses.

The government must recruit a group of committed, hardcore, patriotic zealots, raise a strike force in the lines of Israel’s Mossad and capture Dawood Ibrahim right from the clasp of the country harboring him. This should send a message to the perpetrators of the blast that India means business.

All the families of the 190 people killed must be immediately compensated with minimum 20 lakhs in cash or government bonds, a house, and a car as a symbolic gesture of empathy for a city nested in a country that lacks the spine to safeguard its own citizens.

Since 9/11, how many blasts have rocked America? None. This is because America chose to use its might to go after those who kill in the name of religion. Agreed, that we do not have the unbridled air power, or for that matter any power that America has, but we have to demonstrate to the forces of evil that we can strike back as well.

We are a peace-loving nation? Whom are we kidding? We keep raping our women, burning our brides, bribing our cops, and voting criminals and social handicaps like Arjun Singh to power. If our politicians can garner even a fraction of that will and cunning - they do so judiciously to win elections – to plan and execute pre-emptive strikes across our border, India could be much safer.

As a nation, we must stop resigning such cowardly acts to Karma and start to take matters in our own hands. Yes, we are going to ruffle a lot of feathers, but if we do not take any decisive action now, tomorrow might not be there for us to give us another chance.

It’s not enough that Mumbai limps back every time after each carnage; it is time India kicks some butt.

The Mumbai Spirit

The clunky cranky sound of the iron wheels against the metal track, the rainy chill that permeated the underarm smell of the person standing next, the hunger after a long day's work, and the imagined aroma of pakodas and hot tea filled my senses as the 1764 to Borivili rolled out of Kher station.

And then the deafening sound.

I found myself thrown to the extreme corner of the first class compartment, enveloped in a blackish cloud and that alien smell nauseated my senses. The air was heavy with piercing screams, distress shouting, and a general sense of loss and confusion.

My senses dimmed and my eyes were hazy. I felt a searing pain on my left shoulder drenched with blood. I began to faint. Just before I lost total consciousness, I could feel two reassuring pair of hands reach towards me, then a face, a smile and then blackness.

Today as I lie on the hospital bed surrounded by family, my arm in a cast, I feel lucky to be alive. Lying on the bed, I realize how death stared at my face, grinned, and left me to live another day.

- As narrated by a lucky survivor of 7/11.

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