The General Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), a Mallu by the name of Prakash Karat has met with a terrorist leader from Nepal. According to the Times of India, this meeting was arranged by Indian Intelligence Agencies.
Sandeep (who is the envy of IISc Professors) and The Acorn have detailed analysis

Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Mufti Mohammad Sayeed today said that Kashmir, which was earlier considered a bone of contention between India and Pakistan, will now serve as a bridge between the two countries.[Kashmir will serve as a bridge between India and Pakistan: Mufti]

The reception on the terrorist handsets seem to be poor now. They heard the word bridge and knew they had to do something with it and did what they knew best.

Militants have blown up a bridge on the route to holy cave shrine of Amarnath in Pahalgam area of Anantnag district of Jammu and Kashmir, official sources said here today.Bridge no. 2 at Chandanwari, 15 km from Pahalgam, was blown up by using an Improvised Explosive Device late Monday night, the sources said.Chandanwari is the first halting station for the pilgrims en route to the holy cave shrine in south Kashmir Himalayas.The annual Amarnath yatra is expected to begin next month. Last year, three lakh devotees went on the pilgrimage. [Militants blow up bridge on Amarnath yatra route]

As Robert of JihadWatch asks, What was that again about respect for sacred things?. And guess how many Hindus rioted following this ?

The alleged desecration of Koran story resulted in the death of many Muslims and the reaction has been violent, verbally, in United States

Instead of sending Mr. McClellan out to flog Newsweek, President Bush should have said: “Let me say first to all Muslims that desecrating anyone’s holy book is utterly wrong. These allegations will be investigated, and any such behavior will be punished. That is how we Americans intend to look in the mirror. But we think the Arab-Muslim world must also look in the mirror when it comes to how it has been behaving toward an even worse crime than the desecration of God’s words, and that is the desecration of God’s creations. In reaction to an unsubstantiated Newsweek story, Muslims killed 16 other Muslims in Afghanistan in rioting, and no one has raised a peep – as if it were a totally logical reaction. That is wrong.[The Best P.R.: Straight Talk]

and Jeff Jacoby has more

No one recalled, for example, that American Catholics lashed out in violent rampages in 1989, after photographer Andres Serrano’s ”Piss Christ” — a photograph of a crucifix submerged in urine — was included in an exhibition subsidized by the National Endowment for the Arts. Or that they rioted in 1992 when singer Sinead O’Connor, appearing on ”Saturday Night Live,” ripped up a photograph of Pope John Paul II.
There was no reminder that Jewish communities erupted in lethal violence in 2000, after Arabs demolished Joseph’s Tomb, torching the ancient shrine and murdering a young rabbi who tried to save a Torah. And nobody noted that Buddhists went on a killing spree in 2001 in response to the destruction of two priceless, 1,500-year-old statues of Buddha by the Taliban government in Afghanistan.
Of course, there was a good reason all these bloody protests went unremembered in the coverage of the Newsweek affair: They never occurred.
Christians, Jews, and Buddhists don’t lash out in homicidal rage when their religion is insulted. They don’t call for holy war and riot in the streets. It would be unthinkable for a mainstream priest, rabbi, or lama to demand that a blasphemer be slain. But when Reuters reported what Mohammad Hanif, the imam of a Muslim seminary in Pakistan, said about the alleged Koran-flushers — ”They should be hung. They should be killed in public so that no one can dare to insult Islam and its sacred symbols” — was any reader surprised?[Why Islam is disrespected]

What about those Indians who were holding candles in Marina Beach during the invasion of Iraq, sooo concerned about civilian deaths due to the bombing ? What happened to the Booker Prize winner who wrote pages and pages against the war and the secular Rediff columnist who surfaces only when Maoists are in trouble ? If you are for peace, shouldn’t you be holding candlelight vigils and holding protest campaigns against the terrorists ?

Religious leaders in Pakistan have described the suicide attacks by Muslim freedom fighters in Kashmir as “justified”, but “not justified” if waged within Pakistan.

The religious leaders said that such attacks were also justified if carried out by Muslim freedom fighters in Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan.
They said that in those countries where Jehad is being waged the suicide attacks are justified, but such attacks are prohibited where Jehad has not started even if it is a non-Islamic country.
The statement from as many as 40 religious parties in Pakistan has come as a response to the recent `fatwa’ issued by a section of clerics saying that suicide attacks were forbidden in Islam.[Pakistani Muslim clerics: suicide attacks in Kashmir OK]

At this point Crown Prince Abdullah picked up the phone and called Musharraf and said, “These people are hijacking Islam and using it for murdering innocent Indians.As the guardian of Islam’s most holy sites I cannot tolerate this and we have to put an end to such nonsense. Indians, as you know are friends of ours. They have been supporting us and also their unwavering support for the Palestinian issue even puts Palestinians to shame. Their minister recently carried some vehicles personally. If this is not commitment, I don’t know what is.
Sadly, none of that happened.

Sandeep Pandey wants India and Pakistan to give dual citizenship to citizens of both countries as a solution to all problems. Ever heard of something called partition Sandeep ? Now at this point, Musharraf, who has even rejected the idea of soft borders is wondering, “I have to fight hard against these Indians to be their Enemy No. 1”
Ethnic cleansing continues in Kashmir, and even school children are not spared. Infiltration continues, and innocent civilians are murdered. But Mahesh Bhatt is unhappy that he is not able to get Pakistanis to act in his B-movies

Praful Bidwai has two new theorems. a) Naxalites in 35 districts of India don’t talk to their comrades in the remaining 140 districts and b) if the number of people you murder is numerically less than your opponent, it is OK.
Theorem A, comes from the following statement.

Fears about the ‘Maoist factor’ are, to put it mildly, exaggerated. The Naxalite movement is indigenous. Less than a fifth of the 175 districts affected by it are anywhere near Nepal India’s U-turn for a despot

This makes a fair assumption that comrades in the 35 districts that border Nepal do not interact with their counterparts in other states of India.
So Comrade A1 from Uttar Pradesh meets Comrade B1 from Andhra. After exchanging pleasantries like the number of innocent people they have murdered, Comrade B1 asks for some help. He says that the Andhra police is now hunting them down and the comrades are losing morale and need more arms. Comrade B1 knows that A1 has links with the Maoists in Nepal and wonders if he could help. At this point, A1 shakes his head and says, “Comrade B1, I wish I could help. But that would violate Praful Bidwai‘s theorem A. He wrote recently that only one fifth of the Naxal districts border Nepal are affected by Maoists and since you belong to a district far way, it would not be prudent for me to teach you Nepalese techniques. I may be a murderer, but I am not a proliferator.”
Dejected, Comrade B1 treks through the jungle back to Andhra Pradesh when he is taken out by a police ambush. As his soul flies over the forest canopy, it showers the choicest abuses on Theorem A

Opposing the king does not amount to strengthening the Maoists. Indeed, it can encourage long overdue reform, including land reform, and further decentralization. The Maoists’ methods can be criticized, but not their political platform — a representative, radicalized, democracy. Their violence fades into insignificance beside the excesses of the RNA, which is responsible for a majority of the 11,000 people killed since 1996. India’s U-turn for a despot

Theorem B is simpler to understand. RNA has murdered x people and Maoists have murdered y and since x > y, they should not be blamed. Now if you apply this to Iraq, Saddam has murdered more people than the civilian casualties in the invasion of Iraq and so Saddam, whom Praful Bidwai calls modern day Saladin, should be condemned. But don’t get all goose bumpy here. Invasion of Iraq was done under the leadership of United States, in which case all rules change.

This combat is increasingly following all wars’ dread logic: killing and maiming innocent people, devastating homes, inflicting horrible suffering. What makes it especially loathsome is that it’s being fought in the name of the very people it is turning into a mass of bleeding bodies and severed limbs. If civilians are overtly targeted, the war will become even more unpopular and the anti-war movement more assertive. The demand to bring back US-UK troops will turn into a roar.[The Emperor’s new clothes]

So Theorem B has to be restated: if the number of people you murder is numerically less than your opponent, it is OK, provided you are not America, in which case everything you do is wrong.

Praful Bidwai in defence of Maoists writes

Opposing the king does not amount to strengthening the Maoists. Indeed, it can encourage long overdue reform, including land reform, and further decentralization. The Maoists’ methods can be criticised, but not their political platform — a representative, radicalized, democracy. Their violence fades into insignificance beside the excesses of the RNA, which is responsible for a majority of the 11,000 people killed since 1996. [India’s U-turn for a despot]

I was laughing at the statement describing the future that Maoists will bring to Nepal – “a representative, radicalized, democracy”. There are a bunch of them in India where they live in a democracy and what they don’t do is all of the above. If they believed in democracy, they would stand for elections and try to bring in their reforms. But instead they choose to murder people and destroy public property. Yesterday they raided a mining camp and abducted four officials.

“About 17 gangs, mainly of the PWG, equipped with sophisticated weapons like AK-47 rifles, wireless sets and remote control devices, were reportedly active in Bastar, Dantewada, Dandori, Kanker, Rajnandgaon, Balaghat, Kawardha and Mandla districts,” a police source said. Naxals raze Hindalco camp in Chhattisgarh; abduct 4

Now if these folks are for representative democracy, why do they need to carry AK-47s ? Why do they need to kill policemen and political leaders?. What about the comrades in Nepal ? Narayan Prasad Pokhrel, the chairman of World Hindu Federation-Nepal, was shot dead by the Maoists. If you look at the history of takeovers by Communists, they have always resorted to ethnic cleansing and mass murder. So even by the most lenient standards, one cannot give the Maoists of Nepal any benefit of doubt.
Sandeep has a detailed analysis of Praful Bidwai‘s Maoist cheerleeding.

Even though Musharraf was the man behind Kargil and whose popular hobby is making India a hostage by holding a gun to his head, we are shamelessly giving him a red carpet welcome. On April 17th, Kargil mastermind and Pakistani “cross-border-terrorism-expert” dictator is arriving in India in the pretext of watching a cricket match between India and Pakistan.
Indian bloggers are uniting to protest this visit. Please join by displaying the above graphic in your blog. Details here.
Participating Bloggers: The Acorn, India Defence, Secular Right, Nerve Endings Firing Away, Rabble Rousing Random Ramblings, Seriously Sandeep, Dancing with Dogs, Rojnamcha, Niket Kaisare, Communism Watch, vichaar.org, Quizfan, Marwadi, Suren, Transport Phenomena, Akash Mahajan, Blog of Parag , Null Pointer, Rajagopal, Idhar Udhar, Rediff.com’s Rajeev Srinivasan, Sathish Kumar, Parag, Saket Vaidya, wgaf, sen’s spot, sudeep jain, Atanu Dey, Mahesh Ganapaty
Related Links: We are so flexible, Did Nawaz Sharif Know ?

The Acorn points to this editorial in Indian Express which talks about the gains made by the Naxalites in India. (Naxalites are Communists who think that murdering others is the best way to advance their causes). While the spread of Naxalites are increasing, the Govt is going soft on them. But the troubling news is that, these Communists are anti-nationals as well.

The “admission” by the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) leaders comes in the wake of Chhattisgarh Home Minister Brij Mohan Agarwal’s charge Sunday that Maoists used Pakistani and Britain-made bullets for killing three state police personnel in Sarguja district on Saturday.
Maoist commandoes Kosa and Aaytu told reporters Sunday in a hideout in the state’s southern Dantewada forests, about 420 km from state capital Raipur, that they exchange notes with Pakistani militants on methods of war and accept modern weapons from Pakistan.
Kosa said: “The way we made a base in Bihar, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and have been progressing in Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal, we will be able to capture 30-35 percent of India by 2010.” [Maoists ‘admit’ to Pakistani links]

The aim of CPI(Maoist) is is to establish a Compact Revolutionary Zone and then take their armed struggle to other parts of India.

The Saudi government, itself under assault from Al Qaeda, is not in the business of directly financing terrorism, and since 9/11 it has responded to American pressure to control the flow of charitable funds to active terrorist groups. But what it still pays for, and what the religious charities its citizens are obliged to contribute to pay for, is a worldwide network of mosques, schools and Islamic centers that proselytize the belligerent and intolerant Wahhabi variant of Islam that is dominant in Saudi Arabia. As a result of this oil-financed largess, the teachings of more tolerant and humane Muslim leaders are losing ground in countries like Indonesia and Pakistan. Wahhabi mosques that glorify armed jihad have also made alarming gains among the Muslim populations of Europe and the United States.
For years, Saudi Arabian oil money bankrolled the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and provided financial support to Pakistan’s government. It was Saudi aid that allowed Pakistan to defy international sanctions imposed over its nuclear bomb testing. Without Saudi money there is some question whether chronically impoverished Pakistan could have ever afforded to develop nuclear weapons and the crucial bomb-related technologies that its scientists passed on to Iran, Libya, North Korea and perhaps other countries as well. [The Saudi Syndrome]

The Saudi support for Pakistan’s nuclear program has been reported before and Saudis have used this as a bargaining chip. While Benazir Bhutto was not allowed to visit the nuclear facilities, Saudi Arabia’s Prince Sultan was given a guided tour.
The editorial is a call for Americans to think while buying gas guzzlers. Here in California there are more and more hybrid cars on the road than before. But then what happens in tree-hugging, war-hating California is not a reflection of the nation. The demand for oil around the world is just increasing as China and India need it to keep their booming economies running. This means more money for Saudi Arabia to fund its militant programs.
But as the largest consumer of Oil, it is United States that has to take the lead in reducing its dependency. Will that happen voluntarily ? I doubt unless the gas price shoots up to the unaffordable range or the oil wells dry up, the consumption will reduce.