'A Wednesday'

Mumbai is under siege and so it has been for the past three days since Wednesday. The hotels, the hospital, the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, the Jewish centre, each and every place that was targeted reeks of a well co-ordinated bid to destroy, to violate, to massacre, to ruin and to terrorise. The harbingers of war, perpetrators of evil, hatred, violence and destruction have come together and taken Mumbai hostage.

An attack on Mumbai is an attack on our business capital, the highest tax paying city in the country and it is really an attack on our pride. We have worked hard to improve our situation as a third world country and to be a nation to reckon with and now, if the city that never sleeps, the city that has been the driving force of the progress of our country is under attack, it is an insult, the worst sort of insult to India and to every Indian worth his salt, to every Indian who is proud to be an Indian.

But what has been more upsetting is some of the coverage of the event by the International media. Indian hospitals unable to cope with treating the numerous injured in Mumbai, an analysis of the way in which Indian forces have handled the terror situation, repeated and pointed questions towards Indian authorities and journalists asking them if India is pointing its finger, as usual, toward Pakistan and all such cheap attempts 'to make hay while the sun shines' and boost one's viewership or readership should be forsaken. Its time journalists stop seeing bad news as good news, its time we stop being hounds and become humans, humans that are sensitive to a nation under attack, humans that are mindful not to throw salt upon open wounds and humans that ensure the world comes together in support of a nation fighting terror.