I N his book Thinking, Fast and Slow, Nobel laureate and psychologist Daniel Kahneman writes, `The brains of humans and other animals contain a mechanism thatis designed to give priority to the bad news.

He goes on to say, `Emotionally loaded words quickly attract attention, and bad words (war, crime) attract attention f aster than do happy words (peace,love).` Thus, economists will tell you that the economy is not being addressed, while doctors will tell you that the health situation is deteriorating, and so on.

In the same manner, a person who blindly adheres to his religion will think that his faith is under attack from all sides, and that every secular and liberal ideologue is his innate enemy. The situation may not be as simple as I am describing, but in brief: he becomes impatient, and in his hastiness and desperation, he blows himself up.

In order to cure extremism, we must bear one fact in mind: it is a psychological/ emotional problem.

Until now, those responsible for fighting extremism are instead fuelling it. Merely registering madressahs and condemning religious zealotry won`t quench the fire.

These precautions backfire. Civil society has it all wrong; holding rallies and writing columns against extremism is counterproductive. A potential suicide bomber will not be stopped by such measures.

Instead, we must reach such people before it is too late by seeing extremism as a mental illness and employing subtle ways to cure their sickness. Subtle persuasion, over the course of time, will extinguish the fire burning inside a zealot.

`Continuous ef fort is important, writes Kazuo Inamori in A Compass to Fulfillment, `Rather than mindlessly repeating what we did the day before, we should seek ways to make tomorrow better than today, always adding some improvement tomorrow to our efforts f rom today.

A simple dose of humility and wisdom will form the elixir that will heal our society. Our weapons should not be mockery or abuse, rather, we must fight against every problem with truth. `When truth arises, f alsehood perishes.

Falsehood, by its nature, is bound to perish.` (Al Quran; 17:81) Bashaam Bachani Hyderabad