Is it always going to remain this way?

It is surprising how questions can be so conveniently labeled "diplomatic" and left unaddressed. When a daughter wants to know why her father had to suffer three bullet wounds for a cause that seems more and more meaningless with each passing day, all she gets as a reply is "you are asking me a diplomatic question in a public forum". It has become so easy to turn a blind eye to the widow who lost her husband, the child who lost a father, the family who lost a son, the country who lost a hero.

Ever been in a condition where a loved one is away and you have no clue whether he is alive, whether he is safe? And when the next week, u see a coffin driven to your door step, wrapped in the Tricolour, the only solace you have is THE CAUSE for which it all happened.
But our "leaders" keep refusing to face the reality. All we need is a reassurance that this will end some day. That Kashmir will be ours again and that whoever has fought for that cause did not fight in vain. Can no one ever assure us of that? Is it a pointless thing to ask? Will this go on forever? Well, I do not know where to look for answers to such "diplomatic" questions. It is disturbing. It is unnerving. There are people like us undergoing rigorous training in various defence academies to become soldiers, officers, commandos. For what? To fight and die for an issue that our leaders have learnt to ignore?

One whole chunk of our nation has been taken away and we still do not know whether we are going to get it back. What does this show? Do we not have the courage, the determination and the grit to say out loud and clear that we will get back what we have lost and that no one can divide India?

It was said today that the terrorists are trying to “divide” us. What about the fact that a whole part of India had been taken away by outsiders, been divided and carnaged? Why isn’t anything been done about that? Why are we being asked to live with it? To accept it? Is it always going to remain this way?

Is this mutilation of our country, our pride, and our psyche permanent?

Everyday, another officer dies fighting for the lost land. Living and breathing the dream that is a “diplomatic” issue for our so called leaders- leaders for whom we wait for hours, for whom we rise and applaud.

Our soldiers deserve to know what they are dying for.

Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die
Into the valley of DeathRode the six hundred.

I do not want to believe in Lord Alfred Tennyson. But I am being forced to.
Just like the one billion of us.