Dear Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman,
Thank you for your Service
And Welcome Home!
There is a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes as I pen this.
What has happened with the Indian Military services and the Pakistani Military Services is something that I will not comment on. Purely as facts are often not as clear as they seem.
Social media and our actual media is adrift with various theories and accusations and what not and therefore I am not qualified to make comments. Most importantly I was not there to know how and what happened and importantly will never be able to understand the stress and emotions that you and your family must have gone through.
All I can say is that we are proud of what you did for whatever reasons, be it your orders from high command, you doing your duty or whatever it may be - your valour and courage should not go unmentioned.
And at the same time, it made me think of a couple of things.
1. Social media and the Fourth Estate have made friends of enemies and enemies of friends. We have found ourselves arguing
on #SayNoToWar, #SayYesToWar, #PakistanStrikesBack, #IndiaStrikesBack.
And yet, we are but what can be termed as the #SocialArmy and nothing else.
All we can do is sit and make up our minds with not much factual evidence.
We have become Propaganda experts, Military experts, Historians who can pull out data of conflicts and exchanges and actions from eons ago and sometimes even mindless human beings who are filled with anger, Vengeance and no brains even.
However, at the end of the day, it made us come closer, it opened our eyes to the reality of war. It hopefully makes us think a bit more on how secure we really are.
And for that, I thank you.
2. Utmost respect for all our armed forces. Perhaps, now with so much social media content and access to many many billions of people both in India and abroad, we, the people of India should learn to respect our brothers and sisters in the Forces who live on the edge literally to make sure we sleep well.
Perhaps it’s time for us to question whether you have what you need in terms of equipment, intelligence and support to successfully do what you have chosen to do – lay down your lives for the betterment of us Civilians.
Perhaps it’s time for us to reflect and appreciate all of you a whole bloody lot more and not take our national security for granted.
Perhaps it’s time to say #ThankYouForYourService.
A lot more but nothing less. Just Thank you for now.
So, here’s my call to all of you. If you know anyone in the armed forces, talk to them today. Thank them.
Thank them for their courage.
Thank them for their bravery.
Thank them for what they do day in and day out.
Thank them.
For without them, we will be nowhere. Ever.
Share, Retweet, WhatsApp – use that same social media that has woken us up the past few days to thank the people we know who are out there in the hills, the deserts, the air and the water, ready to lay down their lives for us.
Thank you.
