The 22nd of July, 2011 is a pernicious day marked red in calendar by innocent blood.
The debacle brought forth by Anders Behring Breivik transpires the grave reality that terror threat is not confined to just the radical bureau of one religion. Rather extremist roots are taking strength in nearly all religions. As to why their gradual evolution was overlooked in past might derive various opinions but the absolute urgency is clear: this has to end by all means.
While it is an indubitable fact that seditious organisations comprising of Muslim fanatics have brought havoc with their acts of terror but to discount the ringing acts by extremist cults pertaining to other religions will be a grave indiscretion. Confessions by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (an Indian right-wing nationalist group) for carrying out the 2007 Samjhota Express bombing that killed 68 Pakistanis underlines this same morose reality.
Apart from this, RSS also professed involvement in Malegaon bombings 2006-08, Ajmer Sharif, Modasa and Mecca Masjid attacks. The terror ventures in Nanded, Parvani, Jalna, Mhow in Indore, Nimach, and Bhopal are also attributed to this same right-wing group.
Now whether we talk about such Hindu extremist groups or the likes of Nazis in Europe, the question is: did they come to being just overnight? No. The vitriol brewed by such right-wing groups did give out its pungent smoke before as well. The last year case of a Swedish man arrested for over a dozen unsolved shootings of immigrants in Malmo is one such example here.
The steady escalation of right-wing and the threat they pose was brought on the discussion tables many times. But every time the files were closed owing to the fact that they were marked as relatively harmless. In the past decade, the world spot lights were intensely focused on Muslim terrorism exclusively, hence the peril posed by the domestic radicals thrived behind shades. The outcome of which we see unfolding now.
It is not the time to point fingers at each other. Extremism like a plague has proliferated beyond our anticipation. Shying away from acknowledging the termite that is now eating the moral fabric of more than just one particular religion or society is parallel to behaving like an adamant patient who believes all is well. Any type of misogynist ideology; may it be the mantra of the ignorant lot in Islam, Christianity or Hinduism has to be looked upon as a first degree felony.
Further hesitation in hue of prioritisation or slack comparisons will only end up making the notion of world peace a mere quixotic fantasy of wishful philosophers.
HABIBA YOUNIS
Rawalpindi