Two Marines, Two Fishermen and a whole lot of Nationalism…

A few interesting few questions…

Do you remember the names of the two fishermen who died?
Do you remember the name of the fishing boat?

No mate, no Wikipedia or Google – do you honestly remember?

11 fishermen took a rather rustic fishing boat to the sea to fish for Tuna. The came upon the MV Enrica Lexie was traveling from Singapore to Egypt with a crew of 34 including 19 Indians and accompanied by six Italian marines from the San Marco Regiment. In an ill-fated incident of misunderstanding 11 fishermen were perceived as pirates (Really? Have you seen Indian fishermen lately?), and got mercilessly fired upon, apparently without good cause or intimation. Apparently the country that strikes up the maximum scams to sell us arms, the country where our unofficial head of the country hails from, is full of trigger happy marines who love shooting pirates! And, have no clue of the difference between pirates and poor Indian fishermen!

(Here is bit of a Spot the Differences for whoever trains Marines in Italy!)

Vs.

And two of these marines get arrested for their crimes. The Kerala Police charged two Italian marines aboard the Enrica Lexie, who were identified as Massimiliano Latorre and Salvatore Girone, with homicide under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code and on 19 February 2012 took them into custody for interrogation. And things went through the merry love of our legal system – court to court, a 196 page charge-sheet, 46 material objects and 126 document annexures.

Given our love for Italians, we let the guilty go home to celebrate Christmas and they came back. And then, given our love for the idea of democracy, we let them go home to vote. And then they did not come back. Supreme Court said, maybe in not these terms, “but the Italians said they would be back!” The beauty of their innocence leaves the horizon of naivety miles behind visible range. And then all hell broke loose.

By the way, before I forget, the names of the fishermen were Gelastine and Ajesh Binki and they were sailing the St. Antony.

Like most acts of aggression against India in the past, and possibly into the future, our ludicrous sense of nationalism catches fire only after we have been drenched breathless in gasoline and shoved into the furnace. Some of the fallouts of our nationalism are accounted below.

• There was ruckus in Parliament over the issue on Wednesday with the BJP claiming collusion between New Delhi and Rome – that was to be expected, wasn’t it. We have got a lot of past baggage!
• Union Ministry of External Affairs led by Mr. Salman Khurshid, who ignored red flags when Rome had sent a letter seeking a high-level diplomatic meeting to resolve the issue, is showing all forms of misdirected aggression by detaining the Italian Ambassador to India.
• Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh said Italy had not only violated “every rule of diplomatic discourse”, but also called into question “solemn commitments given by an accredited representative of a government” – seriously mate? Too little too late…
• Mr. Arun Jaitley went on to say “This is an outright fraud against the government of India and Supreme Court by a sovereign nation. This is a case of state-sponsored abduction."
• One columnist even wrote about this being a case of “sophisticated racism”.
• There have even been suggestions to be extra strict on the Agusta Westland chopper deal – so this is what it takes to really get cracking on arms deal kickbacks.
• CPI-M, the clowns of the court had their say too. The acts of foreigners who violate Indian law "with virtual impunity is directly connected with the neo-liberal trajectory of economic reforms" New Delhi has pursued since 1991, the CPI-M said. "In the urge and eagerness to attract foreign investment, virtually succumbing to the dictates of international finance capital, India is increasingly seen as a state that vacillates to firmly uphold our political sovereignty and the rule of law,” said an editorial in the CPI-M journal People's Democracy.
• Sushma Swaraj tweeted, “It is not a case of diplomatic stand-off. It is one of diplomatic send off.” – LOL
• Mr. Modi tweeted too, given all his new tech-age populism, “On the issue of #ItalianMarines, nothing short of their return to India must be the acceptable outcome.”
• Italian car manufacturer Ferrari decided to adorn its Formula One race-cars at the 2012 Indian Grand Prix with Italian Navy flags. Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin has been reported to have said: “Using sporting events to promote a cause which is not of a sporting nature and one which is sub judice is not in keeping with the spirit of sport.”
• Surprisingly enough, Mrs. Sonia Gandhi has remained silent so far.

All of this drama without a single constructive move towards a solution to the problem. Justice must be served and there is no two ways about it. But we should, in the interest of saving what little is left of our dignity, stop making a public spectacle and refrain from politicizing the event to gain publicity mileage. We have led public discourse at a local level to feed into hyper nationalism. Italians have complicated it by lying in court.

What should we be doing? I don’t have the answers. But, I think that some silent diplomatic intervention is necessary, away from the media glare and political critiquing. We definitely cannot conduct state affair with the immaturity of detaining Ambassadors and crying foul (without any substantial actionable outcomes) in the parliament.

Meanwhile, here is wishing Gelastine and Ajesh Binki a wonderful afterlife. May their souls rest in peace and not be lurking to see the drama that is Indian politics.