BlogSphere Mumbai’d

As the casualty count from the 11-July (7/11) terrorist attack of six trains in the financial capital of India Mumbai continued to climb to nearly 200, countless bloggers became victims from the reverberations of the bombings. Indian government officials, initially without any direct evidence pointing to those responsible for the attack, took broad steps, including an order to shut down blogsites in India. Our BeingInBangalore was caught in this dragnet. Our ISP (Internet Service Provider) was required to block access to Blogspot.com in India.

An outcry from BlogSphere ensued. By 21-July, government officials were indicating that only 17 blogsites had been identified for blocking, but “mis-communication” and “technical problems” on the part of the ISPs resulted in several hundred blogsites being disabled. Later eight of the 17 “officially banned” sites were unblocked.

Our local paper, the Deccan Herald, ran a list of some of the unblocked sites that gave us pause regarding the security planning in our current homeland. It was only four days earlier that we had read in the online version of the New York Times a published list from our US Homeland Security of places that were theoretically terrorist targets. The list included a provincial petting zoo, an Amish popcorn factory and such backwater assets as a tackle shop, a check casher, a doughnut maker, a flea market and, in the case of one community, a “Beach at the End of a Street.”

When we visited two of the unblocked sites, we realized that there is clearly a great deal of “intelligence” sharing between our US and Indian security departments. One site, HinduUnity.com, is a Hindu nationalistic site that fits the ban order of websites expressing “extreme religious views.” The site refers to India by its ancient mythical name of Bharat, speaks of the creation of Pakistan on Indian land, supports military campaigns in Afghanistan during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan and makes sure all know that “Islam is the mission of spreading Arabic culture by killing original Hindu culture.” Hmmmm. The bomb blasts in the first class coaches of the Mumbai trains were aimed at well-heeled Hindus.

India is no stranger to bombings carried out by the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). LeT, meaning Army of the Pure, is a well-trained Islamic terrorist group and the armed wing of the Pakistan-based religious organization Markaz-ud-Dawa-Wal-Irshad. Given that there was no mention of Amish popcorn on HinduUnity website, blocking that site was hard to understand.

We also read that http://www.princesskimberly.blogspot.com/ was swept up in the terrorist dragnet by the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team. The blogspot, known as Dreamer - Life through the eyes of me, consists of two postings both from March 2004 by what appears to be a young, bored female college student named Kimi from Texas on spring break (We're not making this up!). Ironically the last blog entry on 25-March-2004 opens with “So, yes… My life is extremely boring! Nothing too exciting to post today.” Oh, Kimi the Dreamer, if only you knew the tumultuous waters into which your thoughts have been tossed!