ISIS (Islamic state of Iraq and Syria, synonym for Islamic state of Iraq and Levant) is the publicized name of a religious movement to give it a geo-political identity. Funded by different countries to hold direct and indirect control on the oil-fields and oil-wells the caliphate movement has got a new direction.
This movement is not something new. In the early years of 20th century Caliphate movement happened in neo-political generation to overpower different monarchs and democracy. They succeeded vastly, but errors crept in and they lost power in a shorter span of time. Caliphates got support from unexpected verticals of politics; most interestingly they were supported by Congress in India. Mahatma Gandhi sat on hunger strike in support of Caliphates; it was reciprocated by Caliphates support in Non-Cooperation movement. In British India, Caliphate movement, widely popular as khilafat in India, failed drastically. The failure led to a little known manslaughter in Malabar known as Mopla rebellion.
With such facts on my finger, I won’t be too much surprised by the possibility of ISIS garnering support in India. Simultaneously, I predict the optimistic age of ISIS to be around a decade which is too small for a group to capture a vast diverse country like India.
In a decade, ISIS will target to have control over Iraq and Syria completely, and then move towards smaller countries like Jordan. These countries are easy to capture with higher returns having similar culture, language and oil. Even India is not in the list of countries interested in fighting this terrorist group; United States, Russia, France, Iran and the Kurds are attacking ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
India’s diplomatic decision of not attacking just a terrorist group i.e. ISIS and continue to wage war against whole of terrorism is highly appreciable. United States will always try to indulge India in a direct fight with ISIS to divert the terrorist attacks from west towards east. Historically, US was interested in a pact with India in curbing Taliban, but the denial of permission of using Indian Airstrips to attack Afghanistan by erstwhile visionary Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee remains a benchmark for all the decisions taken afterwards. Pakistan permitted United States to use their land for attack on Taliban which led to still continuing civil war in the country.
If conspiracy theories are to be believed, the fear of recent possible invasion on India is a hype created by media and politicians in the backdrop of non-existing debate on “intolerance” and forthcoming assembly elections. While media is busy in creating a good impression of ISIS, government wants to project it as a bigger threat than Pakistan and China. Indian Media is acting like a courier of ISIS by providing information about the perks and packages available for the probable recruits. Indian media hailed ISIS when they presented the news of returning of nurses from the war trodden Iraq. Though it was the effort of Ministry of External Affairs, media presented that the nurses were not captive but were provided additional security by the mujahids of ISIS.
I conclude with the fact that ISIS can never attack India and vice versa. ISIS will be short-lived and will end up by 2025. An Indian politician may give obituary to Al-Bhagdadiji. A part of Indian media may show Al-Bhagdadi as a warrior. Though a political party named ISIP (Islamic State of India and Pakistan) may garner support from some minority appeasing political parties.
