Terrorism is a terrible thing. Terrorism is described as a systematic use of violence to create a general climate of fear in the population for political, religious or ideological reasons. It is the greatest threat to humanity in modern times. It has been observed that terror has mainly aimed at easy, soft targets with an objective to get some demands met forcibly, or to attract world attention for its own purposes.
Violence creates a sense of insecurity in the minds of the civilians. It generally destroys the public’s sense of security even in places most familiar to them. Terrorism sometimes also targets buildings or other installations that are important economically or politically, such as embassies or military installations.
The concept of terrorism originated during the French revolution of late 18th century but it gained popularity in the 1970s during the conflicts of Northern Ireland, the Basque Country and the Palestine. Now, modern age terrorism has evolved into a variety of forms. Terrorism has entered the mainstream in many countries such as Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan. These countries have accounted for more than 75% lives lost in 2014. Terrorism is now being spread to more countries resulting in increased number of deaths. In the world, about 210 terror groups and organisations have been recognised till date.
The year 2019 witnessed a number of terrorist attacks. Easter bombings of Sri Lanka, Mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the Pulwama Attack in India are some of the most deadly terror attacks in the history of mankind.
During the Easter bombings, three churches in Sri Lanka and three luxury hotels in the capital Colombo were targeted in a series of well-coordinated terrorist suicide bombings, killing almost 260 people.
In New Zealand, there were two consecutive terrorist shooting attacks at mosques during the Friday prayers on March 15, 2019.
In a Pakistan-sponsored terror attack, 44 CRPF Jawans died on February 14, 2019 in Pulwama district of Jammu & Kashmir (now a Union Territory). A suicide bomber rammed a car fitted with explosives into a CRPF bus. This was followed by an airstrike at terrorist training camps in Balakot, Pakistan, that was conducted by India in the early morning of February 26, 2019, killing 300 terrorists.
To put an end to terrorism, we need to know the reasons behind it. Some of the main reasons can be political, religious, economic, social, and psychological. Religious fanaticism has been observed as the prime reason of terrorism. Religion being a sensitive issue, there is an urgent need of finding solution to end terrorism. In India, many special agencies have been formed to counter terrorism. Some of them are National Investigation Agency (NIA), Anti-Terror Squad (ATS) and Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). But these are not proving to be effective enough in eradicating terrorism completely from the country. In today’s world, technology can help in tackling the problem of terrorism. Social media can play an important role in uniting people to fight against terrorism and help people to live a
fear-free and peaceful life. It was rightly said by Mother Teresa, “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” Active participation by the youth and right understanding of the problem can combat terrorism peacefully. ‘Ensuring peace’ should be the first and foremost motive of all countries before taking military decisions. I think terrorism cannot be controlled by the law enforcing agencies alone. We, the people in the world, will have to unite to end terror globally.