By Rabin Prasad Kalita (EMN)
“Why don’t you go along with someone?” She asked. “I choose to do things my way.” He says finishing his last sip of the coffee. “You’re a true lone wolf.” She replied. A lone wolf is a person that keeps his emotions to himself. Many lone wolves have personal issues like they may be mentally sick; they may have had financial problems and also may link to a deeply held belief of injustice along with a loss of faith in the societal fabric. The hard hitting messages of the jihadist propaganda through mass media and various social networks are fueling more to attract many innocent youths. They propagate hates towards people of a certain religion through unrestrained electronic web pages, tweets, blogs, YouTube etc. Gradually those youths get pumped up with radical ideology and don’t hesitate to seek revenge as per the agenda. It provides a lot of opportunities for lone wolves to learn about terrorist strategies and targets. Lone wolf itself by definition, act alone. In this context it is defined that a single individual or a small group deployed in different public locations to carry out a well-orchestrated attack.
Undertaking lone wolf attacks in India is not as Susceptible as some of the western countries that have faced a lot in the recent past. However, unyielding efforts towards radicalization by some of the most dreaded global organizations have indeed achieved a degree of success. Lone wolf attacks (mostly suicidal) are more likely to be carried out by individuals who are influenced and misled by the appeal of some of the home and foreign terrorist organizations who incessantly trying to lay their seeds in this subcontinent by any means. The propensity of getting encouraged by the youngsters in a very short time is becoming a matter of concern for all of us. Lone wolves tend to strike at a place associated with their personal frustration. It is therefore difficult to identify or capture lone wolves since there are no communications to intercept. Working individually makes it difficult, to track the activities of the person who is planning an attack.
The radical groups are continued to exist as a decentralized global force due to the various internet accessibility. An early arrest of some of the best skype, tweeter handlers in the recent past in India, has given a clear picture of the potentiality of cyber radicalisation. There may be many more of such camouflaged followers roaming amongst us who are all working silently. Although, India remains relatively immune from hostile action, because of our unity in diversity but then looking at the present recruits by global terror groups all over, it would be wise to undertake proactive measures against the potential threat. India is an important target for such groups to disrupt our strength of democratic, secular and open social fabric amongst various casts and creed.
Some of the most recent gruesome killings on mass gatherings in Nice (France), in Orlando (Florida), and in Istanbul night club firing were carried out by such influenced victims where, authorities had no inkling of the plan of ‘lone wolf’. Sydney hostage crisis and Boston Marathon bombing are also among the prominent incidents. If we look some years back, former Prime Ministers of India Smt. Indira Gandhi in 1984 and Shri Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 were assassinated by lone actors only in similar fashion. In both the cases perpetrators were involved with some of their ideal terror organisations. So, probability of getting enticed to this kind of violent acts could pose a grave threat to this country.
Mass gathering of people especially in religious carnival offers assailants a large number of potential targets. While some of the installations have limited protection offered by private securities, but yet a considerable numbers of public places continue to remain vulnerable. Although an ample amount of innovative security measures are in force in most of our prominent temples,but still a blend of human intelligence along with use of new technology would be crucial to defend against such extremist attacks. These treasure trove architectural marvels are proved to be a savior of many poor and also add a substantial amount of revenue to the Govt. treasury.
It would be worth to mention over here that, thousands of devotees visit for the blessings of Maa Kamakhya daily from all over the places of India and abroad. During its annual Ambubasi Mela the amount of pilgrims goes beyond many lakhs which lasts for a period of five days. Although the Govt. of Assam does something for crowed handlings but, mere deployment of security personnel would be inadequate to thwart any such lone wolf attack. To avoid or to impede their staggering range of high-velocity firearms,it is obligatory to revive and reinforce a special Temple Protection Force. It is the duty of the Govt. to safeguard these beautiful historical worshiping places from its potential damage.
