Banning Pak artists

The country’s pseudo-liberal brigade is at it again. This time it has come out against the Raj Thackeray led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, which issued an ultimatum asking Pakistani artists to leave the country.

The only valid argument they can have against such an ultimatum is that it is illegal. But instead of choosing to take that line, they have decided to put their bleeding-heart credentials on display.

Devoid of all logic and any basis, their stance has been nothing short of a betrayal to India. The problem with such people is that they are hardwired to think that art should not come in the way of international conflicts, and that anything coming out of Raj Thackeray’s mouth is bigotry.

Unfortunately, they do not possess the intellectual capacity to understand the strategic implications of their romantic stand.

The simplest argument that one can offer them is that Pakistani artists earn off our country, but pay their taxes in Pakistan. Some of them earn many lakhs of rupees, and are taxed highly back home.

A part of that money, which is Pakistan’s revenue, is allocated to one of Pakistan’s security agencies known as the ISI.

ISI funds, trains and controls most of the terrorism that wreaks havoc within India. Most terror attacks on Indian soil are choreographed by this agency. So essentially, money being earned in India is finding its way to operations that destroy India property and kill innocent Indian citizens.

Some argue that the Pakistani artists are not really at fault here, and that their contribution to Pakistani revenue is relatively negligible. But the question really is this: if we know that the practice of allowing Pakistani artists to work in India contributes even a rupee towards murdering Indians, how can we even conceive of allowing this practice to go on?

Even if one seeks to evaluate this practice based on the larger picture, one would reach the same conclusion. The fact of the matter is that Pakistan, despite whatever façade it puts forth, does not seek peaceful relations with India.

As we debate about whether their artists should be allowed to stay back and earn, several movie theatres in Pakistan have banned the screening of Indian movies. A blanket black-out of all Indian television channels has been imposed in the country.

Many,0 who believe  the Pakistani artists in question are not terrorists themselves and do not deserve to be thrown out unceremoniously for simply doing their job, need to understand that India cannot be a namby-pamby state.