DC Edit | Will Spirit Of India Defeat Terror?

I have lost my father but gained two brothers,” Arathi, daughter of N Ramachandran whom the terrorists killed at Pahalgam on April 22, told newsmen in Kochi on her return from Kashmir. Her reference was to two Kashmiri youth who stood by her through her moments of loss, reflecting the hospitality people of Kashmir showed to the visitors even in extreme situations.

If the reports are anything to go by, Kashmir’s tourism is getting back its vibrancy just a few days after the Pahalgam massacre, thanks to the spirit of those hospitable people, the security forces and the visitors who refuse to be cowed down by the acts of those cowards who masquerade as terrorists.

Thousands of tourists had left the Valley in the immediate aftermath of the attack through whatever means available to them. According to officials, about 80 per cent of scheduled visits to the Valley for the remaining days of April were cancelled while the bookings for May were hard hit.

However, the last two days’ developments point to a turnaround in people’s attitudes with many of them going back not only to Srinagar but also to Pahalgam, trusting the government and the Kashmiris. Operators say the number of queries has also gone up in the last three days, despite the vilification campaign launched by a section of the media against Kashmir.

In a way, this is a cat-and-mouse game engaged in by the people and the terrorists, and it is imperative that those who trust democracy and its processes and those who uphold the ethos that held humanity together for centuries win, and the terrorists lose.

And this makes the job of those who are in charge of the security situation in the Union territory all the more serious. It is said that the security agencies should prevail in all occasions to claim success but the terrorists need to prevail only once for their win.

This is a game which comes with no second chance, and hence the nation must stand by the security agencies and the people of Kashmir so that the terrorists lose every time.