South Asia Daily

Ardhanārīśwara, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, two-spirit people and America

New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s seemingly scolding tone in her tweet above over the Texas abortion debate set me thinking about India; I mean in the particular context of two-spirit people.

The Indian Health Service (HIS), which is part of the Federal Health Program for American Indians and Alaska Natives, describes two-spirit people thus: “Native American two-spirit people were male, female, and sometimes intersexed individuals who combined activities of both men and women with traits unique to their status as two-spirit people. In most tribes, they were considered neither men nor women; they occupied a distinct, alternative gender status. In tribes where two-spirit males and females were referred to with the same term, this status amounted to a third gender. In other cases, two-spirit females were referred to with a distinct term and, therefore, constituted a fourth gender.”

The term that instantly came to mind while reading the Congresswoman’s tweet was the Indian (as in Indian from India) term अर्धनारीश्वर, Ardhanārīśwara, which has existed for millennia. It is a composite of both male and female forms represented jointly by Shiv and Parvati. In Sanskrit, the term means the lord who is half woman. The idea that one of Hinduism’s presiding deities can be half male and half female has existed for millennia in India without there being any controversy about it at all.

The composite broadly means that male and female principles and even energies are inseparable. This is enlightened androgyny.

I just wanted to make this limited reference in response to Representative Ocasio-Cortez’s tweet which some perceived as putting down those who are not necessarily aware of who two-spirit people are.

If I were Xi Jinping...

If I were China’s President Xi Jinping, I would be mighty pleased at one level that five countries, one of them still a superpower, one a has-been super power, one a wannabe superpower, one which does not want to be a superpower even while wanting to be and one never-gonnabe-superpower, have to join hands to contain my country’s perceived global threat.

Yesterday, US President Joe Biden joined Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison to announce a trilateral security partnership to confront China. The partnership includes helping Australia to build nuclear-powered submarines and patrol the Pacific where the Chinese are constantly flexing their muscles. That takes care of my reference to a current superpower (America), a has-been superpower (Britain) and never-gonnabe-superpower (Australia.) That still leaves the wannabe superpower which would be India and Japan, the one which does not want to be a superpower even while wanting to be.

India fits in a somewhat different context here. India along with Japan make up what is known as the QUAD, a quadrilateral arrangement with America and Australia.

It is interesting that Biden announced this trilateral security partnership barely nine days before the QUAD leaders, Biden, Morrison, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga meet for an “in-person” summit in Washington on September 24. One of the overarching objectives of the QUAD is also to confront and contain China.

So If I were Xi, I would be pleased in my strongman impulses that five countries feel compelled to gang up against me. That may or may not be true but the optics of these two arrangements would play well within China’s assertively nationalistic Communist Party cadres whose number touch a staggering 95 million. I am told that Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), whose members can rival the Chinese Communists in professing nationalism, has a bigger membership base.

The trilateral security partnership does have the potential to confuse the mandate of the QUAD and that too coming as it did just days before the latter’s summit. I would be interested to see how Tokyo would perceive Canberra with nuclear-armed submarines. It is true that Australia and Japan are allies now even as Australia’s once strong relationship with China has hit its nadir. But remember in international diplomacy there are no permanent friends or foes. There are only permanent national interests.

One of the dangers of this trilateral and quadrilateral comings together is that it could also fuel China’s paranoia and might provoke it to do something dramatic. The easiest place for it do something dramatic is with India being its next-door neighbor. It is a delicate balance for New Delhi to be part of the QUAD even while professing to have good working relations with Beijing. China does not yet have a matching security partnership except for its unequal ties with Russia, a shadow of the former Soviet Union. Pakistan, notwithstanding its nuclear weapons, is only just a poodle here.

It would be interesting to see how the QUAD summit plays out in the aftermath of the US-UK-Australia security partnership.

I am sure Beijing is paying close attention to both.

Discovering the astounding Japanese artist Uemura Shōen

'Yangguifei' by Uemura Shōen, 1922

For the past week or so I have been enraptured by a Japanese style of painting that I chanced upon on Google Arts and Culture, my permanent watering hole. The style is called Nihonga. I will write more about that style in another post. For today, I want to focus on just one work by an extraordinary Japanese woman artist called Uemura Shōen who went on the become the first painter to break through the confines of women artists having to work their art within their homes. She became one of Japan’s most renowned artists.

The work that has cast an enduring spell on me is titled Yangguifei and is dated 1922. It is 189 X 161 cm. It shows what seems like an aristocratic woman being groomed by someone who is likely her servant. Everything about this work is breathtaking immediately but most of all it is Uemura’s excruciating attention to details and preciseness of her lines. There is more artistic talent in any tiny corner of this work than I will ever acquire in several lifespans.

No matter where you look in this painting you are stunned by Uemura’s genius. Take for instance how brilliantly she captures the light behind the fine bamboo curtains that show glimpses of bamboo leaves. The filtered nature of the light is so exquisitely captured. As your eye travels from the picture’s right to left, you notice that the bamboo curtains curl up a bit by some breeze offering you a slight peek outside. The light in that split is markedly sharper and brighter and bamboo leaves in greater resolution.

The aristocratic woman’s poise is extraordinary. Look at the sheer blue stole-like covering and how astutely Uemura captures that effect of the fabric’s sheerness.

In the foreground there is another screen through which you can see the young woman adjusting the aristocrat’s headgear. Notice how light from the room changes as well as the light from outside, filtered twice over, also changes.

The precise architectural lines of the furniture, the tiles, the curtain patterns, the jewelry box and so on are so meticulous as to leave me exhausted just looking.

I regard this as among the finest paintings I have seen. What is remarkable is that everything that Uemura painted was of this caliber.

Dawn dawns and dusk dusks ever so subtly despite unfathomable motions of everything

One of the unrivaled joys of my morning walk these days, which starts around 5.50 a.m. after putting in about two hours of work, is the subtle yet distinct change of the sunlight. It is at once imperceptible but still quite perceptible.

When I begin, the light is darkish grey as if someone has knifed away the darker layer from the sky. Dawn is in the process of dawning or as I said to myself in Hindi this morning “होते होते सुबह का होना”. In barely a minute or so or perhaps even less that darkish grey turns to gentle white depending on whether there are clouds on the horizon. On a cloudless day the early hue is gentle white. Within couple of minutes the surroundings are clearly visible as the sunlight settles into its normal shade.

Apart from this visual experience I am more interested in numbers behind the so-called “sunrise”. We all know that the sun never rises or sets. That experience is a direct consequence of Earth’s spin arounds its axis. That number at the equator is 1,037 mph (1,670 km/h). In Chicago area, where I live, that spin is a bit slower because it is 2,891.56 mi (4,653.52 km) north of the equator. As one moves away north or south of the equator the spin slows down a great deal.

We forget, if many of us even bother to know this at all, that no matter what we do we are spinning at about 1,000 miles an hour on a planet that orbits its sun at about 67,000 mph (107,000 km/h). It has been calculated that Earth travels about 1.6 million miles (2.6 million km) a day. That makes it 66,627 mph (107,226 km/h). In one year, Earth travels some 584 million miles (940 million km) in a single orbit around the sun. Think about this, we do absolutely nothing and yet we travel so much minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year. We are born frequent frequent fliers. It is no wonder then that Earth lets you travel free. 

I have written about these motions a few times before. For instance, scientists have calculated that our solar system moves at 200 kilometers per second which is an average speed of 448,000 mph (720,000 km/h). That is dizzying fast and yet our solar system takes about 230 million years to travel around the entire Milky Way. Despite orbiting at that speed since the formation of the solar system some 4.571 billion years ago it has done only a little over 19 rounds of the Milky Way so far.

Despite such enormous numbers in spinning and orbiting through the duration of our lives we feel no motion sickness. We also do not get tossed around on the surface nor get flung out into space because of Earth’s powerful gravity. And what is magical is the exquisite subtlety with which dawn dawns and dusk dusks (Dusk is not a verb but I have used it with literary license.)

Multiverse, Steady-state and I

 

Warning: This is utterly nerdy.

 

The idea of Multiverse in the context of the Steady-state model of the origin of the universe has occupied my mind for a while. Connected to that is an interview I had done with the well-known Indian physicist and writer, Dr. Jayant Narlikar over 35 years ago.

 

That conversation with Dr. Narlikar left me with an interpretation of the great physicist, Dr. Fred Hoyle’s Steady-state theory which I had distilled from my conversation with Dr, Narlikar. Incidentally, Dr. Narlikar worked with Dr. Hoyle.

 

My interview with the well-known American author and physicist, Dr. Paul Halpern yesterday produced an exchange that bridged my three-and-half-decades-old understanding of the Steady-state as well as where the idea of Multiverse might fit within that theory.

 

This may be an utterly nerdy thing to say but I am inordinately thrilled that I was not off the mark from age 18 to age 60 now.

A few observations about making a debut in Arnab Goswami's TV universe

For what it is worth my bit is at cue 25.45 onward.

Yesterday, I made my debut as a television talking head even though it may turn out to be a one-time outing if no one else invites me. Gabbing away has never been a problem for me from my childhood, coupled with absolutely no stage anxiety or fright. None. Nervousness in any circumstances has been absent throughout my life no matter who I am talking to and where and when.

So when a producer with Arnab Goswami’s Republic TV reached out with a request to participate in a panel discussion on the theme whether the Western media aided the Taliban in their propaganda war after the takeover of Afghanistan, I said yes with some caveats. They had tried to get me on a couple of times earlier but both times it clashed with my interviews for Mayank Chhaya Reports. One of the main caveats was not really a caveat but a word of caution. I essentially told them that I am a serious hard news journalist not given to frothing at my mouth in paroxysms of made-for-television outrage. I said I am not a decibels-driven journalist. I also mentioned that I will not be a party to any nationalistic drivel. The Republic representative assured me it would be none of that.

The reason for qualifying my appearance was Arnab’s reputation for fire and brimstone anchoring style no matter what the story. I do not know Arnab personally. I have never met him. I did for the first time yesterday virtually. When I started as a journalist, he was eight. He is 48 now. I had some sense of his early work at India Today and from what little I knew of him he seemed to be a sober and substantive young journalist with a sharp mind. I have now been out of India for some 23 years, a period during which Arnab has morphed into a fire-breathing television host that he is today with a cult following. I bring no judgment to that other than saying it is not my style of journalism.

With that as the backdrop, I agreed to be on the panel yesterday for Arnab’s 10 p.m. segment, which I was helpfully told is the “most watched” on Indian television. Arnab was markedly sober and mellowed with occasional flashes of his TV persona popping out, particularly when he read in a mocking tone some of the straightforward news reports out of Afghanistan to suggest that Western wires and others were suddenly trying to be just factual. I did not quite understand the problem there. But let that pass.

I was aware of his reputation of not allowing his guests to speak but quite refreshingly that was not the case. In any event, I had agreed with a clear mind that if it turns out to be commensurate with that reputation, I would just sit there both amused and bemused. However, that was not the case like I said. A few times he asked me to jump in but I did not because he singled out the panelists by name he was addressing and I did not want to be a tasteless gatecrasher. Of course, a tasteless gatecrasher is what one must be these days on TV or even social media to be heard and seen. After some 25 minutes of Arnab’s back and forth between other panelists, he specifically asked me to comment on something. I said my piece fully without any interruption at all from Arnab or anyone else. By the standards of the crassly performative television around the world, this was a remarkably sober engagement.

I can see why Arnab has a sense of consequence about himself, which may or may not be justified, because soon after my appearance I started getting some extra friend requests on Facebook. There was a pattern to those requests. They seemed to be coming from those who not only believe in Arnab but those who steadfastly and uncritically support Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

I might as well clarify for their benefit. Well before the social media era, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I was being described by some of the grandees of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), 40% in jest and 60% seriously, as a “pseudo-secularist.” That, incidentally, was the mildly pejorative term reserved by the political right for journalists like me who did not take doctrinaire positions in favor of their favorite causes but reported the news as it should be—shorn of editorial emotionalism. Strangely, that very attribute also earned my colleague Tarun Basu and I a great deal of respect among the very BJP leadership.

“Pseudo-secularist”, which I never was, has now degenerated into terms like libtards or libdus. For those political right believers and sympathizers seeking to be friends with me on Facebook merely because I was featured on Arnab’s show and hence may now be reformed in their perception, please don’t. I am still what I have always been—a pure liberal driven by demonstrably proven reality and facts. I welcome you but you might be disappointed if you are looking for a blinkered ally. I am not.

Some of my journalist friends who broadly share my worldview may have been a bit wary of my appearing on Arnab’s show. To them I say, that is the best way to test one’s convictions such as they are. Echo chambers do not help. To Arnab’s credit, he did let me speak uninterrupted and even asked me a few times to jump in. It is not my personality to jump in merely because the water looks inviting.

It was gracious of Arnab to invite me and I did thank him at the outset. 

Krishn raises Mount Govardhan

 

One of the great joys of not being religious or even spiritual—the latter is a bogus idea anyway but more about that some other time—in the Indian context is that one can genuinely appreciate the arts emanating from that glorious cultural tradition without the burden of piety. The distance from piety to sacred is not that far. So it also saves one from being sacred. Also, the distance from sacred to sanctimony is quite short. So one is spared being sanctimonious too. But I digress.

Speaking of glorious arts emanating out of India’s splendidly creative religious manifestations, I found this astounding late 16^th century painting (1590-95) on Google Arts courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MoMA). What is more is that the MoMA has made it available for free download.

The painting is titled "Krishna Holds Up Mount Govardhan to Shelter the Villagers of Braj". It is a folio from a Harivamsa (The Legend of Hari (Krishna). Its dimensions are H. 11 3/8 in. x W. 7 7/8 in. and it is done in ink, opaque watercolor and gold on paper.

Today happens to be celebrated as Janmashtami or Krishn’s birthday across India and in many parts of the world.  The painting represents the idea that Krishn is lifting Mount Govardhan much to the astonishment of some around him. There are those who are just going about their business. There are so many brilliant details to this work.

What struck me first is the choice of a resplendent, turmeric yellow pitambar that Krishn is wearing contrasting against his famous cumulonimbus blue complexion.

Those around Krishn watch with a mixture of awe, reverence, befuddlement and even indifference. In one case, a man is blissfully asleep, oblivious to this magical feat. The expressions on people’s faces are a remarkable study by the unnamed painter. There is so much life unfolding around Krishn. There is a half-naked child with a distended belly riding astride a fierce-looking bull. Speaking of the bovine presence, there is, of course, no Krishn without the cow. There are so many lovely ones in this painting, each with very different expressions. There are buffaloes and goats as well.

Mount Govardhan has its own lovely ecology that is so distinct from the plains it towers above. The painter has done an extraordinary job of capturing the flora and fauna. There is even a white leopard lurking in a corner eyeing an antler or two.

In the left-hand middle corner, there are what seem like two tradesmen, one Hindu and the other Muslim, apparently in the midst of a transaction even as Krishn raises Mount Govardhan.

Everything about the painting gives one the sense that it all in a day’s work, for Krishn to raise a mountain, for tradesmen to do their deals, for some to sleep, for some—a leopard—to stalk a prey, for antlers to climb the mount and so on.

And the use of colors is awe inspiring. Who knew that watercolors could be so striking!

This is a fantastic painting. I am so glad I chanced upon it.

On the great Firaq Gorakhpuri's 125th birth anniversary today

Today is the 125th birth anniversary of the great Raghupati Sahar 'Firaq Gorakhpuri', one of my most favorite literary figures. I have written about Firaq in these columns a few times. I might as well republish a piece I wrote on June 13, 2013. Apart from his brilliant poetry, Firaq was a great raconteur with the gift of the gab that was both erudite and remarkably funny. He had a birdlike demeanor enhanced by his innate charisma and complete absence of self-consciousness. he had the self-assurance of someone who knew that when he spoke people heard him in rapt attention.

June 13. 2013

Raghupati Sahay ‘Firaq Gorakhpuri’ has long been one of my favorite literary figures. Regarded as one of the most important names in Urdu poetry, literary criticism and language scholarship, Firaq, which means separation in Urdu, was one of those naturally charismatic people. A thinker of subtle but charming self-absorption, he was at equal ease teaching English literature (his professional calling) and creating and reciting his Urdu/Persian poetry.

It is a pity that there is a sparse audio-visual record of Firaq because he was such an effortlessly cinematic figure and could have lent himself to a terrific full-length documentary feature. I have seen few people who smoke cigarettes with such relish and yet such detachment at once.

There is a short documentary about him, which was made by India’s Films Division in 1971, available on YouTube. He was already 75 then. Born in 1896, he died in 1982 at 85. There are also a couple of other sessions from a different video about where he holds forth on how language often rises from much more intimate sources such as individual families. (See the video above). It has one of those rare stimulating conversations carried out by Firaq, unmindful of and unselfconscious about the presence of TV cameras. With his cigarette dangling he discusses finer points of language.

He makes a couple of striking points when he says,”Bhasha ka base illiteracy hai. (The base of language is illiteracy).Aur literature kehte hain brilliant illiteracy ko. (Literature is brilliant illiteracy).” He also says that brilliant literature should not be defined by the use of words that ordinary, perhaps even illiterate, people do not use.

“ग्रेट लिटरेचर और ब्रिलियंट लिटरेचर वही है की इतने बड़े बच्चे को जो लफ़्ज़ मालूम है उस से वह गीता लिख ले  (Great literature aur brilliant literature wahi hai ki itne bade bachche ko jo lafz malum hai us se who Gita likh le,” ( Great literature and brilliant literature is one where the words that a child this small knows can use to write the Gita),” Firaq says.

He illustrates his point about the accessibility of great literature by giving the example of Charles Dickens and how his cleaning lady could enjoy his books in her free time. He says the great Hindi writers Premchand and Surdas both had this facility.

I admit to not having read Firaq much but from whatever little one has read one can infer his intellectual depth. I say infer because Firaq was a great proponent of being able to infer when one is not well-versed with something.

The short Films Division documentary does an effective job of capturing the more compelling aspects of Firaq’s personality. Obviously gifted with a charming sense of humor and great skill as raconteur, Firaq’s presence at poetic conventions was a major draw. There are a couple of places in this documentary where Firaq opens his recitation with humor. In one he describes how a man falls inside a well. A poet happens to pass by and he too falls inside the well. Rather than looking for ways to rescue themselves, the poet declares that he would recite some verses from his poetry. The other funny incident that Firaq narrates is about a haunted house which no one wanted to buy. A poet, unable to find any home for himself, decides to buy it. He then drives the ghosts away by reciting his poetry.

There is so much to quote from Firaq’s great body of poetic works but for the purposes of this post I would like to cite just one throwaway line from this documentary.

ज़ुल्मात के सीने में हमदम

मैं रोज़ चराग़ाँ करता हूँ

(In the heart of darkness, my dear

I always spread light (His literal words are ‘I light lamps everyday’)

Firaq’s poetry was also defined by the influence of nature, something he said he was inspired to do by the likes of Wordsworth. There is a short discussion with students in this documentary about it.

Perhaps I am wrong but one no longer finds this level of erudition and this finesse and sophistication in articulation of great ideas that the literary giants such Prof. Sahay commanded with such lightness of touch. Pay attention to how he says what a civilization like India has had to balance for millennia before it acquired its greatness.

There is zero provocation for this post today, but then do we really need a reason to acknowledge people of such brilliance? I don’t think so. Not that I need any inspiration to write my own poetry but in the midst of watching this documentary I wrote a ghazal which contains a subconscious tribute to Firaq in these two lines:

ज़ुल्मत से जंग छेड़ने की आदत है मेरी पुरानी

भीगी तीलियों से अब नहीं होता आग जलाए रखना

Their free translation would be:

Battling darkness is my old pastime

But I can no longer keep the fire going using damp matchsticks

A heartening response to 'Gandhi's Song' so far

It has been a little over two months since I released my documentary ‘Gandhi’s Song’ my YouTube channel. As of this morning it has been watched by over 1600 people, 30 of whom have commented and 86 have liked it. There is not a single dislike yet.

What is particularly heartening for me is that for a big majority of viewers the documentary has done precisely what I set out to accomplish, namely rescue ‘Vaishnav Jan To’ from Gandhi’s looming shadow and introduce its creator, the great 15^th century Gujarati poet-philosopher Narsinh Mehta. That was summed up in a tweet this morning by a viewer named Natasha Bardia who said, “Must confess that I've not given the origin of "Vaishnava Jan" so much thought, but it's likely that I would have sided by the one who said #Gandhi composed it! Thanks @MayankChhaya for this telling film!”

It is remarkable that so far there is not a single dislike or even a gratuitously insulting comment on it which I suppose represents the essence of Narsinh Mehta’s gentle prescription for a righteous life as written in the song. I do not presume for a moment that things will remain as upbeat and positive. In fact, I had not even remotely expected people to watch it, let alone like it.

If I add up all the numbers of those who watched it before I released it in the public domain, the total could easily come to in excess of 30,000 plus. I concede at a time when even some of the tritest and and the silliest of videos, including reaction videos, notch up millions of views easily, my numbers are embarrassingly low but it is my hope that at least the essence of the song will spread by word of mouth from those who have bothered to watch it.

It is refreshing to note that young viewers have warmed up to the documentary which is always a good sign. That a poet speaks to him some six centuries after his passing is highly encouraging.

The purpose of this short post is to thank all those who have watched it and done so with obvious attention. I am grateful.

Afghanistan, Pakistan, strategic depth, China and suchlike

The perspective that Pakistan has long viewed Afghanistan as a country that provides Islamabad strategic depth against India, something which I have written about, is once again coming into play. This is especially because the international community generally and America particularly watch how Islamabad positions itself vis-à-vis the return of the Taliban to Kabul.

There is of course a strong military-intelligence community in Pakistan that believes that the Taliban triumph is by extension their triumph since the Taliban leadership owes them a great deal accrued over the last 20 years of the US invasion and occupation. There have been reports of celebration in some quarters in Pakistan over what they regard as a victory of the Taliban and, with some glee, a defeat of the United States.

The idea of strategic depth is an interesting one but I am no longer sure how consequential it is in the face of great advancement in weapons and other technologies. The logic of territorial fallback is of a 19^th or early 20^th century vintage which may not have the kind of importance it was believed for a long time. However, in so much as Pakistan feels it has the reassurance of territorial depth against India because their mentees are now in control of Afghanistan it has relevance for India.

There is an added factor to Pakistan’s sense of triumph and perhaps even relief which has to do with its assertion that India has long fomented separatism in Balochistan via groups such as the Balochistan Liberation Army which had the ability to operate from Afghanistan. With the Taliban in charge Islamabad would expect Kabul to eliminate that threat altogether.

Left to Pakistan it would like India’s presence and influence in Afghanistan completely erased. What is standing in its way is that ordinary relatively liberal and urban Afghans have great love and regard for India. According to one estimate some seven million Afghans are entirely urban-dwellers, young and largely unfamiliar with the terrible cruelties of the Taliban. In the overall scheme of things they may not be so influential but it is a constituency that might prove problematic for the Taliban. India has the ability to use its soft power to influence this constituency.

The biggest problem that the Taliban will come face to face with rather quickly is their woeful ignorance and even incompetence in running a country. They can no longer pretend to be outsiders armed with nihilism against the system because they are the system now. It is one thing to gleefully wield  American weapons and dress up in American combat gear, including helmets with night vision goggles but quite another to run a country which will soon be out of hard cash.

That is where India and the world need to watch out for the role that China is expected to play. China's is a leadership completely devoid of reformative impulses or obsession to introduce Jeffersonian democracy like America. It will quickly establish a ruthlessly transactional and pragmatic relationship to exploit Afghanistan’s rich mineral resources as well expand its much-cherished Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This is even while ensuring that the Taliban’s Islamic fundamentalist virulence does not seep into Xinjiang Province and its grotesquely persecuted Uyghur Muslim population.

There is thinking doing the rounds of social media that the US withdrawal is a fiendishly well thought plan by Washington to saddle China with the Taliban in Kabul. The logic being that China will be mired in the quagmire and in the process its feverish march to the world superpowerdom will be slowed if not halted altogether. That is a rather fanciful notion at best. People forget that China’s international operational method is markedly different from America. Like I said, it has no reformative impulses to alter the societies it gets involved with. Its primary goal is to serve its national economic interests. For now, Afghanistan offers that possibility and the Taliban will soon desperately need funds. It can print some Sharia currency but who is going accept that?

With today’s twin explosions at the Kabul airport it is certain that the Taliban will come under great pressure via some tough sanctions unless it guarantees that such acts are stamped out. Of course, there is also the likelihood where, once most of the Americans and other non-Afghans have left the country the international community may not care much as long as there is no external terrorist attack mounted from the Afghani soil. Among the things that the Taliban ought to fear is international indifference as it struggles to govern an impoverished country that is also facing serious droughts.