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Is India under terro
THE bomb blasts last Friday and Saturday in Bengaluru (earlier called Bangalore) and Ahmedabad, two of India’s most important commercial cities, come after a series of similar terrorist blasts in other cities over the last couple of years.
Almost 50 people were killed in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad, scores injured. Both attacks had the same imprint of low-intensity explosive devices with timers, leading to the conclusion that they must have been perpetrated by the same terrorist outfit.
The Ahmedabad outrage was particularly diabolical: two bombs were set to go off in the trauma rooms of hospitals where patients from the earlier bomb blasts had just been admitted.
The bombs used were fairly primitive and cheaply made. They were tied to bicycle handles, kept in lunch boxes, or left near crowded places like bus stops. The reason the toll was much higher in Ahmedabad than in Bengaluru was apparently because the intention was to kill in Ahmedabad, to scare and disrupt economic activity in Bengaluru. The latter city could also have been a ‘dry run’ for the former.
Ahmedabad is in Gujarat (ironically, the home state of Mahatma Gandhi, the apostle of non-violence) and Bengaluru, India’s prime information technology city, in Karnataka. Both states are ruled by the Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
In 2002, following the deaths of some Hindu pilgrims in a train, Gujarat witnessed the worst Hindu-Muslim communal riots in its history, during which several hundred people died. There were serious allegations that the riots were state-sponsored, with the accusing finger pointed at the BJP’s Narendra Modi, the then chief minister who was re-elected fairly recently.
Police officers who had played a dubious role in the riots were promoted by his administration. He even boasted that terrorists would not dare attack his state, a boast that has now proved hollow.
In Karnataka, the BJP came to power only last May, with a surprise win over the Congress Party. Karnataka’s capital city, Bengaluru is India’s most important infotech hub, with about 1,500 IT firms, accounting for a third of the country’s $41bn software exports.
Very similar blasts as the ones in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad took place less than three months ago in the tourist city of Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan, a state that is also governed by the BJP. There is now speculation that the next target could be Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh, another state where the BJP is in power. Is there a pattern to these terrorist attacks?
Some of the worst outrages in recent years have been: seven bombs on Mumbai’s suburban trains killed over 200 people and injured 700 others (July 2006); two bombs on the Samjhota Express, a train service intended to improve Indo-Pakistan relations, killed 68 people (February 2007); and 42 people died from two explosions in a park in the city of Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh (August 2007). The list of other terrorist attacks, where the toll was not so heavy, is much longer.
Clearly, India has somehow become a prime target for terrorists. Indeed, outside Iraq and Afghanistan, more Indians have probably died from terrorism in the past quarter century than in any other country in the world.
From 1984 to 1991, terrorism in Punjab took a fearful toll of some 30,000 lives and in Jammu and Kashmir, since 1991, about the same number have died due to the ongoing secessionist movement in that northern state.
The Indian government claims that in both states, which border Pakistan, the terrorists got training and arms from Islamabad, a charge that Islamabad has all along denied. In addition, there have been terrorist bomb blasts and attacks in various parts of India, the most serious being the Mumbai bomb blasts in 1993 — some of the perpetrators of which were convicted only recently — following the destruction of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya by Hindu fanatics.
The Pakistani ‘hand’ could partly be blamed for the terrorism in Punjab and Kashmir. But what about the attacks in the last few years? Most observers feel that home-grown terrorist outfits, motivated by the pulling down of the Babri mosque and subsequent communal riots, with little or no direct link to Islamabad, are responsible for them.
Two outfits in particular are being singled out: the Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), which has been linked to the Pakistan-based Lashkar-i-Taiba, and the Harkat ul Jihad ul Islam (HuJI), a Deobandi group initially based in Bangladesh — it was allegedly responsible for an attempt on the life of former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina — but which has spread its tentacles in India. HuJI is supposed to be behind last year’s November blasts outside various courts in the state of Uttar Pradesh, targeting lawyers who had vowed not to defend HuJI suspects.
Be that as it may, the truth of the matter is that the Indian police have yet to catch any of the perpetrators of the terrorist attacks in the last few years. There have been ‘leads’ and arrests but no convictions. That is an embarrassment for the police and a failure of India’s intelligence apparatus. Attacks like those that took place on the Mumbai trains, at Jaipur, Bengaluru and Ahmedabad must have taken a great deal of advance planning, with a large number of terrorists involved. How come the intelligence agencies got no wind of them?
BJP leader Lal Kishen Advani has blamed the Congress Party for the blasts in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad, saying that it has been too “soft” on terrorists and that more stringent laws against terrorism need to be enacted. However, mere legislative measures cannot halt terrorism. An efficient police force and an effective intelligence network, spanning the whole of India, is required, something that is not there on the ground and will take a long time to build up.
So much for the bad news. But fortunately there is some good news as well. Terrorists have two main objectives. One, to damage the economy and disrupt day-today life. Two, to create hatred between Hindus and Muslims. Till now, neither of these aims have been achieved. Life went back to normal in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad after the attack. In fact, in Ahmedabad reports say that Hindus and Muslims rushed into the streets to help each other after the bomb blasts. ¦ The writer is a former editor of Reader’s Digest and The Indian Express.
Almost 50 people were killed in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad, scores injured. Both attacks had the same imprint of low-intensity explosive devices with timers, leading to the conclusion that they must have been perpetrated by the same terrorist outfit.
The Ahmedabad outrage was particularly diabolical: two bombs were set to go off in the trauma rooms of hospitals where patients from the earlier bomb blasts had just been admitted.
The bombs used were fairly primitive and cheaply made. They were tied to bicycle handles, kept in lunch boxes, or left near crowded places like bus stops. The reason the toll was much higher in Ahmedabad than in Bengaluru was apparently because the intention was to kill in Ahmedabad, to scare and disrupt economic activity in Bengaluru. The latter city could also have been a ‘dry run’ for the former.
Ahmedabad is in Gujarat (ironically, the home state of Mahatma Gandhi, the apostle of non-violence) and Bengaluru, India’s prime information technology city, in Karnataka. Both states are ruled by the Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
In 2002, following the deaths of some Hindu pilgrims in a train, Gujarat witnessed the worst Hindu-Muslim communal riots in its history, during which several hundred people died. There were serious allegations that the riots were state-sponsored, with the accusing finger pointed at the BJP’s Narendra Modi, the then chief minister who was re-elected fairly recently.
Police officers who had played a dubious role in the riots were promoted by his administration. He even boasted that terrorists would not dare attack his state, a boast that has now proved hollow.
In Karnataka, the BJP came to power only last May, with a surprise win over the Congress Party. Karnataka’s capital city, Bengaluru is India’s most important infotech hub, with about 1,500 IT firms, accounting for a third of the country’s $41bn software exports.
Very similar blasts as the ones in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad took place less than three months ago in the tourist city of Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan, a state that is also governed by the BJP. There is now speculation that the next target could be Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh, another state where the BJP is in power. Is there a pattern to these terrorist attacks?
Some of the worst outrages in recent years have been: seven bombs on Mumbai’s suburban trains killed over 200 people and injured 700 others (July 2006); two bombs on the Samjhota Express, a train service intended to improve Indo-Pakistan relations, killed 68 people (February 2007); and 42 people died from two explosions in a park in the city of Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh (August 2007). The list of other terrorist attacks, where the toll was not so heavy, is much longer.
Clearly, India has somehow become a prime target for terrorists. Indeed, outside Iraq and Afghanistan, more Indians have probably died from terrorism in the past quarter century than in any other country in the world.
From 1984 to 1991, terrorism in Punjab took a fearful toll of some 30,000 lives and in Jammu and Kashmir, since 1991, about the same number have died due to the ongoing secessionist movement in that northern state.
The Indian government claims that in both states, which border Pakistan, the terrorists got training and arms from Islamabad, a charge that Islamabad has all along denied. In addition, there have been terrorist bomb blasts and attacks in various parts of India, the most serious being the Mumbai bomb blasts in 1993 — some of the perpetrators of which were convicted only recently — following the destruction of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya by Hindu fanatics.
The Pakistani ‘hand’ could partly be blamed for the terrorism in Punjab and Kashmir. But what about the attacks in the last few years? Most observers feel that home-grown terrorist outfits, motivated by the pulling down of the Babri mosque and subsequent communal riots, with little or no direct link to Islamabad, are responsible for them.
Two outfits in particular are being singled out: the Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), which has been linked to the Pakistan-based Lashkar-i-Taiba, and the Harkat ul Jihad ul Islam (HuJI), a Deobandi group initially based in Bangladesh — it was allegedly responsible for an attempt on the life of former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina — but which has spread its tentacles in India. HuJI is supposed to be behind last year’s November blasts outside various courts in the state of Uttar Pradesh, targeting lawyers who had vowed not to defend HuJI suspects.
Be that as it may, the truth of the matter is that the Indian police have yet to catch any of the perpetrators of the terrorist attacks in the last few years. There have been ‘leads’ and arrests but no convictions. That is an embarrassment for the police and a failure of India’s intelligence apparatus. Attacks like those that took place on the Mumbai trains, at Jaipur, Bengaluru and Ahmedabad must have taken a great deal of advance planning, with a large number of terrorists involved. How come the intelligence agencies got no wind of them?
BJP leader Lal Kishen Advani has blamed the Congress Party for the blasts in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad, saying that it has been too “soft” on terrorists and that more stringent laws against terrorism need to be enacted. However, mere legislative measures cannot halt terrorism. An efficient police force and an effective intelligence network, spanning the whole of India, is required, something that is not there on the ground and will take a long time to build up.
So much for the bad news. But fortunately there is some good news as well. Terrorists have two main objectives. One, to damage the economy and disrupt day-today life. Two, to create hatred between Hindus and Muslims. Till now, neither of these aims have been achieved. Life went back to normal in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad after the attack. In fact, in Ahmedabad reports say that Hindus and Muslims rushed into the streets to help each other after the bomb blasts. ¦ The writer is a former editor of Reader’s Digest and The Indian Express.
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