Terrorism

04.04.2004 Terrorism – its impact on the present day world. Terrorism is not a new phenomenon. If we take it to mean the use of violence to achieve one’s goals, we can see that it has always been an integral part of man’s existence. For how can we deny, whether it is war or an isolated incident of wife-beating, that violence is involved - violence which brings terror to the victim? But in today’s parlance, we would hardly call the wife-beater or a much-decorated war-veteran a terrorist. The definition of terrorism has been confined to the large-scale violent activities by secretive organisations against states and its citizens in order to bring to power governments after its own ideology. The LTTE, Irish Republican Army (IRA), Basque separatists, the various outfits in Kashmir and now, Al Qaida, are all universally recognised as terrorist organisations. But many of these organisations claim to be freedom fighters. In fact, these organisations work hard and ingeniously at winning over public support at grass-root level. So the saying, “One man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter” makes sense. Whatever the public perception, the terrorist eventually relies on wanton violence. It is here that the common man must pause to ask an all important question. What causes man to take to the path of violence? While many would believe that the New York Twin Towers’ destruction is a prime example of terrorism and the unfolding scenario of America avenging itself militarily against its perpetrators is the sort of answer that would solve the problem of terrorism. I think this is only a superficial response. We must realise that the root cause of all terrorism, nay violence, is a restless mind. Even if we liquidate all proven terrorists, today’s saviours may be tomorrow’s totalitarian regime. It is not difficult to imagine an anti-terrorist America tomorrow setting out to structure the world according to its vision, and backing it by its own form of terrorism (economic, maybe). An end to this vicious circle can come only at the individual level, when - if not all individuals, at least the most influential ones - take to the path of calming one’s restless mind. This brings us to the subject of spirituality, which is the art of self-realisation – meaning, we discover peace in the truth of our essential self. Unless we discover peace, it is a truism to say that we would be restless. So long as we are restless, we would be a breeding ground of all forms of perceived lack or hurt. Thereafter we, in our agitated state of mind, seek external causes for our problems of lack or hurt. We, in our hallucination, conjure up the enemy and thereby we are born again as a terrorist to avenge our hurt. Unless we understand that all the so-called macro (social) problems of this world have a solution only at the micro (individual) level, we would simply be beating around the bush attempting erroneous solutions to an imagined problem. Our relationship with today’s world, thereby, would become a violence-ridden one.