Terror returns to India; First strike after 26/11 kills nine including two foreigners

Terror returned to India after 14 incident-free months when an improvised explosive device (IED) went off on 13 February 2010 killing nine and injuring 60 people in the western Indian city of Pune. Two foreigners, an Iranian and an Italian, were among those killed. The IED was planted in a popular eatery in an area frequented by foreigners.

This is the first major terror strike in India outside of insurgency-hit Jammu and Kashmir and the Northeastern states after a series of co-ordinated shootings and bombings in Mumbai on November 26 2008 in which over 170 people were killed.

The Pune blast took place at German Bakery, which is close to the Osho Ashram and a Jewish Chabad house. The bakery and the ashram are frequented by a large number of foreigners. Like in the case of the 26/11 incident, the motive of the perpetrators appears to be to create fear among foreign visitors to India.

Investigations into the nature of the blast and its perpetrators are still on, but security agencies seem to be suspecting the hand of the Indian Mujahideen (IM), a home-grown terrorist outfit which has links with the Karachi-based (Pakistan) Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT). In recent months, security forces had succeeded in arresting a few key operatives of the Indian Mujahideen. It is believed that some fringe elements of the outfits could have been behind the Pune strike.

Investigators say the Pune blast bears the Indian Mujahideen signature because of several reasons including the fact that ammonium nitrate and RDX were used to trigger the blast. The same modus operandi was used in earlier blasts in Delhi, Ahmedabad and Bangalore in 2008. Interestingly, David Headley, a LeT operative who is one of the prime accused in the 26/11 strike, had conducted a recce of the area in which the Pune blast took place in 2008-2009. Headley is now being tried by the courts in the United States for plotting the Mumbai attack.

The Pune blast couldn’t have come at a more inopportune time for the Indian government. Foreign secretary level talks between India and Pakistan are scheduled for 25 February, a move that has come in for criticism from opposition parties in India. They say that India’s participation in the talks goes against the spirit of the government’s resolve that there would be no diplomatic engagement with Pakistan till the latter provides concrete evidence of action to dismantle the India-directed terrorism infrastructure.

Intelligence agencies have warned that Delhi, Kanpur and Indore are on the radar of terrorist groups. This is bad news for India and New Delhi, which is hosting the Commonwealth Games between 3 and 14 October this year. Other sporting events in which international teams are participating like World Cup Hockey and Indian Premier League Cricket are also scheduled between now and the Commonwealth Games. Security agencies have been emphasising that there is no specific threat to the Commonwealth Games, the biggest sporting event that India is ever hosting. But concerns among international teams are bound to rise if India witnesses more terrorist attacks in the next few months.

Nagaraj Bedathur