By Anil Merani: There’s a stark contrast between Karan Veer Mehra’s poem subsequent clarification and the grim reality of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in India. The Pahalgam attack on April 22, 2025, where innocent civilians were targeted and killed, serves as a brutal reminder of this disconnect. Advising the victims’ families to refrain from seeking retribution with clichés like “an eye for an eye makes the world blind” can come across as dismissive and empty, especially when the victims were not the aggressors but ordinary citizens enjoying their own country.
Mehra’s poem, rooted in Ashutosh Rana’s words, aimed to reject hate and emphasize shared humanity, condemning terrorism broadly. His April 27, 2025, clarification on X—that terrorists deserve severe punishment and his intent was to break the “chain of hate”—shows he wasn’t advocating passivity but rather unity over divisive narratives. The poem sidestepped the specific context of Pakistan’s role in perpetuating terrorism against India for decades, including high-profile attacks like 26/11(166 killed) and countless others in Kashmir and beyond. This omission made his message feel abstract and disconnected to those grappling with raw grief and anger.
For the families of the Pahalgam victims, the call for peace without addressing the need for justice or deterrence against a state-sponsored threat like Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)-backed terrorism can seem like an oversimplification. These families aren’t seeking vengeance for its own sake but accountability for a pattern of violence that targets Indians, often selectively based on faith, as seen in attacks on Hindu pilgrims or Sikh communities in the past. This frustration reflects a broader sentiment: while unity and compassion are noble, they cannot substitute for a nation’s duty to protect its citizens through decisive action, whether military, diplomatic, or economic, against a hostile neighbor.
Mehra’s critics, including those on X who called his delivery tone-deaf or accused him of performative activism, likely felt his poem ignored this pragmatic need for self-defense. The trolling, including Elvish Yadav’s jab implying foreign allegiance, reflects a perception that Mehra’s message inadvertently downplayed the urgency of confronting Pakistan’s role. The death and rape threats he faced are indefensible and excessive, but they highlight the emotional volatility of the issue—people feel betrayed when public figures appear to prioritize idealism over the lived trauma of terrorism.
His defenders, however, argue he was unfairly targeted for a message meant to heal, not inflame. They see the poem as a powerful reminder that terrorism doesn’t represent any religion, aiming to prevent communal division within India. This is a valid perspective, but , it misses the immediate context: Pakistan’s state-backed aggression isn’t a vague “hate” but a calculated strategy. Families of victims, like those in Pahalgam, aren’t asking for an endless cycle of violence but for their government to ensure such attacks don’t recur. India’s history of restraint—post-Uri and Pulwama surgical strikes being rare exceptions—hasn’t always deterred Pakistan, which continues to harbor groups like Lashkar-e-Ta