I still recall how afraid you were of the hissing sound of heat and steam escaping through the regulating valve of the pressure cooker in your early childhood. You would ask us to “switch it off” as if all unpleasant situations could be dealt with just as we turn the lights on and off by pressing a switch.

This souvenir popped up from the memory store when I looked at the very compelling picture of a pressure cooker stuffed with an explosive device which makes the cover page of India Today’s issue of 16th Oct 2006.

The magazine was in fact reporting the “inside story of how the Mumbai police cracked the conspiracy and arrested the culprits” responsible for the multiple explosions on passenger trains in Mumbai on 11th July last. On that fateful morning terror merchants, masterminded by LeT organization, planted RDX explosives in ordinary pressure cookers and left them in train wagons packed with travellers.

The idea of transforming a device involved in sustaining life through food preparation into a killing agent is disgusting. Even more revolting is targeting innocent civilians rushing to work by train to … earn their bread! One must be a real monster to stage such a tragedy, which claimed 187 lives, shaking in its trail the Indian city and the world.

Unlike countries like Britain where train stations are fitted with cameras, which facilitate identification of trouble-makers on their sites, Indian authorities had to go through even more painstaking investigation to unmask the terrorists. Hence the blast sites were meticulously searched for clues that could elucidate this “blinder of a case”.

As the one who uses the sword always perishes by the sword, the “first break came from Jogeswari last site where the BDDS sleuths found pressure cooker handles”. It was found that the cookers were purchased in two shops in Santa Cruz, Mumbai. The pressure cookers betrayed those who misused them.

Air and heat is trapped in the pressure cooker when in use. The temperature rises and infuses steam inside food being cooked thus shortening the cooking time and promoting better cooking. The first pressure cookers were devoid of the multiple safety devices to regulate heat and pressure and caused frequent explosions in unfortunate kitchens.

Thanks to scientific progress, billions of households can now safely use this practical device invented by French physicist Denis Papin in the 17th century. It marvellously caters for the busy trend of modern life, which does not leave much time for preparing food in more traditional ways.

There are a lot of shortcomings in our homes, our society, our world which raises the pressure. This is no justification for blowing up the whole thing. There are other ways like mutual understanding, dialogue and negotiation to regulate the pressure, that is what short-minded and wicked-minded people like terrorists fail to understand. They will never have the upper hand, they never have had.

Hence while I was writing this letter to you and while you are now going through it, tons of meals are being prepared in the pressure cookers of India and elsewhere. Life has claimed its rights and the device its original use. Let’s hope and work hard so that it stays that way.

<B>ALAIN JEANNOT</B>