The Bangladesh threat

Arun Shourie talks about how, the present governor of Uttar Pradesh had warned, as far back as 1996, about the impending threat of the rise of a "third Islamic State" in the subcontinent.

T V Rajeswar, the former head of the Intelligence Bureau and the present governor of Uttar Pradesh had predicted this dire threat in a series of articles published in The Hindustan Times, way back in 1996. Shourie raises a valid point when he says,

Does the fact that you now know that he, and not I, to say nothing of Mr Advani, wrote all that make the warnings ring true? Or do you conclude that because he wrote in this refrain, T V Rajeswar is a closet communalist and should not be allowed to continue as Governor of Uttar Pradesh?

Should he too be dismissed from his post of Governor because, as will be clear from the expressions he used in these articles, his ‘‘ideology’’ is not compatible with the ‘‘ideology’’ that the new Government and its props profess?

In fact, Rajeswar had gone public with these warnings for good reason. For three of them, actually. First, the entire Northeast, much of Bengal and Bihar are indeed being inundated by this demographic aggression. Second, as Rajeswar documented, apart from everything else this swamping constitutes a grave threat to national security. Third, he had been trying in vain to awaken successive Prime Ministers and Home Ministers to the menace. To no avail.

In doing so, he indirectly indicts his own government too.

But that is not the point!

The point is... now that Rajeswar will formally hand over his report to Home Minister, Shivraj Patil, will the government sit up and take serious note of this threat that has the potential to become another headache for India which is already suffering from the never-ending Kashmir problem!