Because Islam has held the monopoly on suicide bombers for far too long...

So recently two bombs were planted in Bombay auditoriums Thane and Vashi. One was diffused by police and the other went off and injured 7 people. Well there may have been universal condemnation in Indian media but it was not all quite for the right reasons.

“When we heard that Hindus have been making bombs, we were happy. But we felt ashamed when we read that the blast injured were Hindus,” says the editorial for the Bombay paper Saamna, a mouthpiece for the Hindu Nationalist Shiv Sena party. In fact the piece was titled: titled "The dud bombs of Hindus! Why embarrass us?". Yes those shoddy bomb-makers put upon all Hindus a grave shame, the shame of not being good enough to even put together a decent bomb, let alone have the guts to go and blow their guts all over the place with it like their Muslim brothers.








That's right folks, Hindus need suicide bombing squads to compete these days!

"Islamic terrorism is on the rise in India and in order to counter Islamic terrorism, we should match it with Hindu terrorism," the unsigned editorial said in Marathi. "Just like Islamic extremism, to safeguard the country and Hindus we must create Hindu suicide squads if Hindu society is to be saved."

One has to wonder, this is a Hindu nationalist party... and isn't Hinduism meant to be a peaceful reilgion? I mean there may have been a lot of bloodshed in the past but does this make sense? I mean how far back into samsara do you think one gets thrown? They probably get reincarnated as cockroaches. And what happened to the great Hindu tradition of ahimsa, or peaceful resistance? I think Gandhi has turned in his grave so many times by now that he's burrowed a hole to the centre of the earth.

Let's look at the Goverment's reactions? The Congress Party, aka. staunch defender of secularism says "The Congress strongly condemns the remarks said to have been made by Mr Bal Thackeray with regard to the formation of suicide squads. This is a clear call not only to lawlessness and violence but will be also the death knell for peaceful democracy," its spokesperson Jayanthi Natarajan told reporters in New Delhi. I agree, India is a secular democracy, not a Hindu nation.

And the BJP? Aka. the moderate Hindu nationalist party that used to hold Government in India and is still a major contender? Criticising the comments, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday advised its ally to respect the law. “People should not take law into their hands. It is the duty of the government to counter terror,” BJP Vice President Venkaiah Naidu said. Fairly weak response designed to not lose any Shiv Sena supporters. Nice.

So seeing as the monopoly may be broken are we going to see Mormon terrorism now? Jehova's Witness extremism? Scientological suicide attacks? I'd like to see Tom Cruise blow himself up on Oprah's couch, that'd be something. Or maybe he'd do it Last Samurai style and go nuts with a big sword? OK I know I shouldnt be making light of this but seriously this is ridiculous. Has Inda not seen enough bloodshed during partition? What about Bombay? The riots? When will people learn?

HT Times coverage here and here for the Government reaction. The Age coverage here (yes it made the Aussie papers).