The comment of the day comes from a Dilip D’Souza post in which Dilip asks why people in India are angry about 26/11, but haven’t demonstrated the same outrage for 1984, 1992-3, 2002 etc—a worthy rhetorical question. Anyway, an (unfortunately) anonymous commenter writes:
Dilip, lets be honest. Nobody is angry. People are watching Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi in record numbers. Everybody’s planning for New Year party. Celebrations are on in full swing. Who is angry ? Of course if you purposely go to some angry gathering you will find some angry people, but that is a tautology. By & large, Mumbai carries on just the same.
Karachi trains a person to kill 17 Indians on average. Send 10 such persons, you get 11/26. What if they sent 100 such persons ? Then also nothing will happen. People will watch Chandni Chowk to China in record numbers and get on with life.
Your city is beyond anger, cynicism, disgust, beyond all human emotions. Mumbai has achieved what Buddhist monks call Zen. Nothing or nobody can make you angry. Say Karachi sends 1 lakh persons tomorrow on some Cruise ship to Mumbai. Each one takes on 17 Indians. 17 lakh Indians will be minus. The rest will watch Billo Barber.
I love the last line. I don’t actually agree with the comment—people in Mumbai are getting on with their lives because we have no choice, not because we feel no emotion—but that’s a minor quibble.