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January 15, 2004
A closed chapter
Peerzada Salman looks back at 2003 as it is shelved and although the events may now be a thing of the past, their consequences and repercussions are here to stay
Another year has whizzed past us. As usual, there was a lot to ponder over and very little to cherish. Much water flowed under the bridge while many bridges were burnt. The fires lit by a clash of civilizations turned to smouldering ash.
All over the globe, the media found sufficient fodder to satiate their appetite for news. For what can make a better news item than killing, destruction and havoc? Yes, there were other reports as well.
British Columbia, to begin with, suffered a dispiriting fiasco. Mick Jagger was knighted and Michael Jackson was charged with child abuse — as if we gave a hoot.
Who could forget the Sars epidemic that for some inexplicable reason made everyone read Albert Camus’s The Plague over and over again? Borders with Hong Kong were sealed. Masks, all of a sudden, were an “in vogue” fashion accessory. Anyone who contracted the flu thought, “this was it”. He or she had “had it”. The entire world had become cagey.
On the local front, first it was the cricket World Cup defeat that made tongues wag and then the LFO. The army chief’s uniform was the most “talked about” set of clothing. Perhaps “they” loved Amir Adnan’s sherwanis that General Musharraf wore to Agra better. Apart from the famous handshake gesture, this could have been one of the reasons that India pulled back its forces from the borders, since the hullabaloo that the uniform issue had created was ear splitting. The entire world, leave alone our hostile neighbours, would have plugged its ears with cotton swabs. All these news items filled the newspaper pages and television screens for quite some time.
On the other hand none came even close to what happened on March 21, a news that is yet to lose its newness and for more than nine months has been helping pen pushers and TV anchors earn their livelihood like never before: the invasion of Iraq. Americans, Britons, Italians, Poles, Spaniards, Ukrainians and Danes set out in search of the weapons of mass destruction that Iraq’s leader Saddam Hussein — reportedly, supposedly, hypothetically — had hidden somewhere in Iraq.
Iraqi cities were bombarded with clusters and MoBs (mother of all bombs) with relentless impunity. Once the country was overwhelmed, unhinging guerrilla warfare began. According to a report no less than 8,000 civilians lost their lives and more than 20,000 received injuries for reasons best known to the coalition forces or the creator. Not to mention 544 confirmed coalition deaths. In Baghdad alone, according to the city’s morgue, a little over 1,500 deaths had been reported.
Amidst all these deadly games, Saddam Hussein was captured and one thought that it might stem the flow of deaths. It was not to be. Violence was rampant like an epidemic in Iraq. Suicide bombings, sniper firing and all other kinds of fighting were rife. The world stood helpless — and confounded.
But helplessness and confusion weren’t the case when aviation authorities decided to permanently ground Concorde planes, the epitome of Sybaritism. The so-called sensitive-to-the-global-issues artists like Sting and Joan Collins were the fortunate ones to board the very last Concorde flight, while children in Iraq were being trampled under the dust of an inexplicable war.
And then, as if man-made, self-inflicted catastrophes weren’t proving enough to jostle mankind into realizing it was losing all that was the hallmark of sentient beings, nature struck with immense ferocity: an earthquake hit the ancient Iranian city of Bam, one of the country’s major cultural centres and a renowned tourist attraction, which was reduced to a shapeless heap of debris. Some reports suggest that out of the total population of 90,000, approximately 40,000 men, women and children got killed. The dead lay on football pitches and on grass verges. Hundreds of bodies were placed in rows across the pitch.
According to reports, every open space was turned into a makeshift mortuary. Rescue workers shouted for body bags instead of first aid. Conjectures were being made that “a coalition of the willing” was to be formed to help the city recover from the disaster.
To say that the year 2003 was a calamity-fraught one would be an understatement. If it is to go down in history, it has to be remembered as one dotted with thousands of unaccounted for corpses, innumerable mutilated bodies and countless saddened hearts.
But isn’t that what history is all about? Perhaps not. Apart from gory tales, history also embodies events of unprecedented achievements. And mankind accomplished many a goal in 2003, foremost of which was that it rid the world of the weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, bigotry and found ways to prevent natural calamities. Didn’t it?
Therefore, it becomes that much more significant to take stock of things and look into the future. What do we see? Is it a vaccination? Or is there any substance, which could help mankind improve its complexion tarred with redness of blood? Will we be able to rediscover our innate goodness?
Some glimmer of hope has been provided by the recent ease in India-Pakistan relations. Going by the general response, one feels sabre-rattling will be put on hold and warm embraces will be the order of the day. However, one must consider the whole issue with a pinch of salt. There’s a fine line between diplomacy and hypocrisy. One glaring example is Israel.
Peace talks have only remained “talks” and ground realities suggest bloodletting is “on” as if it is the staple diet of the people calling the shots, to whom prosperity for Palestinian people is a threat to the high pedestals they’re comfortably perched on.
But as Ernest Hemingway once wrote, it’s silly not to hope. One must see the glass hall full. And while seeing the glass half full, one must also not overlook the fact that Hemingway himself committed suicide. That phase must never come.
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