Bangalore's Black Friday : A wake up call
Venkatesha Babu -
Friday, July 25, 2008 6:27 PM
The serial, low intensity blasts in the city, luckliy hasn't done significant physical and fiscal damage but the psychological damage might be more long lasting. Inspite of the doubling of population in the last 10 years and phenemonal growth witnessed thereof, the tech city has always had a laidback attitude to security. Yes, blasts happened in places like J & K, Delhi, Mumbai or Gujarat, but Bangaloreans were blase and always had the attitude that the easy going ways of the city ensured that it was somehow immune.
Today's blasts prove that this is no longer true. Even incidents of this nature per se is not new to Bangalore. In 2005 an IISc professor was killed by some terrorists. It was an isolated incident and the city quickly forgot about it. While experts have been warning for years on how Bangalore and its booming tech industry presented a soft underbelly for terror attacks, the local government and Bangaloreans have never taken this seriously. Probably it is high time this attitude changed.
While the opposition parties were quick to pounce on the two month old BJP government for failing to prevent the blasts, given their very nature it is near impossible for any government to ensure fool proof security. Yes, intelligence gathering has to improve. But more important is for the citizenery to be alert. More than the government an alert citizenry is the best guarantee of security.