Indian Security

While packing for my recent trip to India I purposely by-passed one of my favourite T-shirts. It's a shirt with the words, "Old Navy" on it, but more importantly, it has a flag of the United States front and centre. I left it behind because, after all the attacks on the sub-continent by Islamic militants, I thought it would be prudent not to tempt fate.

In this same vein of thinking, I imagined that security at the airports and hotels and other public areas would be strict and it seemed, initially anyways, that this was indeed the case. On landing at the Delhi airport, police with long guns and hand guns were present everywhere. In our need to find our hotel's shuttle we walked into apparently secure areas and were re-directed several times away from the customs' areas towards the exit from the terminal by armed policemen.

When we arrived at the Sheraton late at night we were impressed by a contingent of three security guards who insisted that our cab driver open the hood and the trunk of his car. They employed mirrors on wheels to search the underside of the cab and then waved us through to the reception area. The entrance to the hotel had a metal detector, we were wanded by a guard and all bags had to go through an x-ray machine.

While I fell for this show of security initially, it quickly became apparent after the first day that the security measures in place were nothing more than just a show -- a masquerade, in fact, a sham. The inspection at the gate was never more than a perfunctory examination of the contents in the trunk and under the hood of our car. Our suitcases and various bags and other items were never once picked up or looked at. The back seat of our car and the glove compartment of our car were never ever inspected. Before entering the hotel, our bags were put through an x-ray machine by listless hotel employees who were more concerned with ingratiating themselves with guests than with making a true inspection of the many bags and packages we brought in through the front doors of the hotel.

Similarly, two incidents at two different airports go to illustrate the point recently made by Jyoti Thottam at time.com in an article entitled, "India still a soft terror target a year after Mumbai:" In the article, Thottam quotes Ajai Sahni, Executive Director at the Institute for Conflict Management -- "We remain as vulnerable today as we were on 26/11," says Ajai Sahni, using the shorthand for the Nov. 26, 2008, attacks. "Corruption undermines and negates everything."

Exhibit A: Our departure from Goa was uneventful except for the fact that after checking through the first two layers of security consisting of first, a check of our documents and secondly, a check of the same documents again, we had a few hours to pass before our departure. At some point soon after checking through these two security points, I returned to the soldier who had waved us through to see if I could step out for a few minutes and have a cigarette. This junior soldier, suggested I check with his superior stationed at the initial check point. His superior flatly refused my request to step out of the terminal to smoke. I returned disappointed and the junior soldier asked me what had happened? I told him forlornly that there was no way I would be allowed out. Taking pity on me, the junior soldier quietly pointed out a hallway which led to the arrivals hall. Once I got to the arrivals hall, I simply walked out of the terminal, because that's what arrivals do, had my cigarette and simply re-entered through the arrivals level back through the hallway leading to the departures and to my benefactor, the junior soldier. I thanked him for letting me step out to smoke and he waved me back into the departures area. Security breached.

Exhibit B: An even more egregious example of the type of soft target which Sahni refers to is my experience at the international departures terminal at the Mumbai airport. My reason for breaking security was again the evil weed. Our flight was to depart at 1 a.m. We went through four security stations at 7 p.m. Once inside the terminal I quickly realized, after repeatedly asking various people if there was a smokers lounge somewhere, that I was trapped in a smoke free facility with hours and hours to kill. That and the and the portent of the 22 hour flight ahead of us propelled me to try one last time to grab a cigarette before departing.

Before trying to find a quiet corner of the terminal in which to risk some unknown consequence for smoking in a non-smoking area, I decided to visit the nearest washroom outside our departures lounge. There was an attendant present in the bathroom, a rectangular room with ten stalls on either side. I asked the attendant if there was anywhere I could smoke? The attendant looked to his left and right and rubbed thumb and index finger together -- The universal sign of money.

I said, "Okay, where?" The attendant led me to the farthest stall on the left side of the room, unlocked the unoccupied stall and held the door open for me. At first I thought that he was offering me the stall as a place for satiating my addiction. Once inside the stall, however, I realized that a second door led from the stall into a small closet which measured a square metre at the most.

There was no lighting in the closet, or chair, or window. The attendant left the door slightly ajar and said, "smoke." Desperate for my cigarette, I stepped in, lit up and found a bit of a ledge which ran all around the room to sit on. After a few puffs, I began to look around the room. I began to wonder if all the smoke was streaming into the main area of the bathroom. And then, as my eyes adjusted to the dark surroundings, I noticed some light streaming in from the ceiling. A hole the size of a football had been cut into the ceiling thereby allowing any smoke to vent out into the open air.

I could easily hear the noise of cars passing by outside, the ubiquitous honking of car horns and then it occurred to me that it would be quite easy for anyone to lower a small package into this little anteroom, thereby allowing me to by-pass four layers of security at what must be one of the largest and busiest airports in India. The entire cost of this surprising breach of security was a sweet 100 rupees...about $2.50.

To quote Ajai Sahni again, "Corruption (in India) undermines and negates everything." Despite all appearances since 26/11, India continues, at least in my experience, to remain as porous as ever.