B'lore Boys Are Now Bhais

Bang's Boyz. Sounds like a nice name for a music band. But Bangaloreans Sabeel Ahmed and Kafeel Ahmed were not into music. They were into something superior, something that would fetch them more than the world's most popular music band. Like bombs. Driving a car bomb to death, destruction and damnation. Driven by a cause.

Mercy be to the Maker, the Glasgow airport bid failed to take off. But it has left deep scars. Now, the UK, the West does not know where the next hit will come from. What next? Heaven knows, the next Jihadi could be a music star. Why not? If Kafeel could "engineer" a plot with Doctor Sabeel, it could be anyone out there. Brothers they were, but little did anyone knew that they were brothers-in-arms.

Now, Bangalore has gained a devastating edge to its international fame: Who is the first Indian to be involved in an international terrorist act? Bangalore's three - the other doctor, Haneef Ahmed, now under custody in Australia.

It simply doesn't fit in. The Ahmed duo hail from a family of doctors and live a quiet life in their Banashankari residence, virtually unbeknownst to their neighours and even relatives. Kafeel was brilliant in studies, and bagged the 5th rank hile doing his mechanical engineering. His cv reads like one that any youth would die for: BE (Mech); M.Phil, P.hd in Aerodynamics. What it doesn't say is more than the sum of the whole: A Jehadi. It's something which you and I and even his parents are flummoxed by. Why? Why? Why? Destiny, perhaps. But hello, did the Ahmeds undo their destiny with their dastardly act??

A post-mortem of what kind of life the brothers led when they were in Bangalore lends a clue. Whether they are only clues or something that adds up to a larger truth, is for the police to unearth. Will they? And when? Hopefully, not before some other Ahmed rips off a few more bombs. The doctor-engineer pair used to advise their friends (the few they had) - Don't smoke, don't drink, don't have meat, don't watch movies, don't listen to music, don't have fun. They why live? It doesn't make sense, does it? But they are answerable to a higher god, and so they answer, live to die. A martyr's death. But what about taking the lives of those who you are taking? Innocent people, whom you haven't seen, heard, known, and who have absolutely nothing to do with your life?