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India-Pakistan

The dice is loaded for Kashmir

2014-08-26

[DAWN] On July 25, exactly a month before the secretaries were planning to meet in Islamabad, India and Pakistain traded doubts, shall we say, over the delay in two politically sensitive terror trials ' the Mumbai nightmare trial that New Delhi wants to be hastened, and the Samjhauta Express bombing, which Pakistain believes has taken too long at the trial stage. The perpetrators of the Mumbai carnage are linked by India to elements in the Pakistain army. The suspects in the Samjhauta outrage are likewise considered close to the new ruling establishment in Delhi. Itas become a 'who-blinks-first' kind of situation. A day after the Mumbai versus Samjhauta spat, India's defence minister shifted the focus to the heated up Line of Control in Kashmire, saying the cross-border firing would figure in the foreign secretariesa talks. However, the difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits... the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... Military Observers Group in India and Pakistain claimed the same day, to New Delhi's chagrin, they were there precisely to keep a close watch on the alleged infringements. What Mr Modi told his army commanders in Kashmire ' that Pakistain was too weak to wage war so it was fomenting terrorism against India ' was also part of the pattern of moving away from the May 27 bonhomie. It wasn't as if India was single-handedly fomenting doubts about the peace talks. Pakistain though distracted by its domestic political turbulence, or perhaps because of it, had been keeping pace. Mr Modi made his combative comments on Aug 12, making the diplomatic corps comb for similar hints albeit in vain in his Independence Day speech three days later. However, the difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits... Pakistainas envoy in Delhi had flaunted unusually candid postures about Kashmire too ' about it being at the root of bilateral disputes with India. Such comments are rare if the two sides are heading for talks that would but of course include the Kashmire dispute. In any case, does Pakistain have a view on Article 370? Or does it see it as an Indian ploy to divert the focus from the main issue of Kashmireas future? Or does it in fact feel comfortable with the Kashmire issue hanging fire so as to conserve its greater energies to confront an issue more palpably urgent than Kashmire ' the division of spoils in Afghanistan?

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India-Pakistan

Pakistani Taliban vow to attack "BJP-backed terror camps in Kashmir"

2013-01-24

[Dawn] Pak Taliban have said the UN bodies and the United States should stop the "BJP-sponsored state terrorism ... any action taken by a non-Moslem state that constrains the violent impulses of Moslems or their allies ... in Kashmire," otherwise the TTP has the ability to strike inside Indian-administered Kashmire. Speaking to Dawn.Com on Wednesday, the TTP front man Ehsanullah Ehsan said that the Indian Home Minister's statement regarding BJP-backed terrors camps is an open confession that Hindu gunnies are being patronized under the state's authority for killing innocent Kashmiri Moslems. "The US and UN should also order drone strikes and coalition troops invasion, to target these terror camps, which are mentioned by the Indian minister of fanning Hindu terrorism," said Ehsan. "If the US and the UN could not take care of the state-sponsored-terrorism in Kashmire and the BJP/RSS terrorism against Moslems in India, then TTP has the ability to strike and take care of it." Indian Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde had accused the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its ideological mentor the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) on Sunday of promoting Hindu terrorism, which in turn was responsible for the fatal bombings of the Samjhauta Express among other Moslem targets. To a query, Ehsan declared the present jihad in Indian-administered Kashmire as "merely a drama" and talked about a "practical jihad" for freedom of the Kashmiri Moslems. About launching attacks on the BJB and RSS terror camps, the TTP front man said, "Soon everyone will realise how much ability they (TTP) have and how they are going to strike both, Indian state terrorism centers and the Hindu bully boyz organizations."

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India-Pakistan

Samjhauta Express blast: Indian agency nabs a key suspect

2012-12-16

[Dawn] In a major breakthrough in the 2007 Samjhauta Express blast case, the Indian authorities on Saturday placed in durance vile Please don't kill me! Rajesh Chaudhary, suspected to have planted bombs in a Pakistain-bound train, Press Trust of India reported. Rajesh Chaudhary alias Samundar was arrested from Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh. There was a bounty of Rs 500,000 on his head also. The blast, in 2007 had left nearly 70 dead and 100 injured -- most of them Paks. The National Intelligence Agency (NIA) has already charged Aseemanand, Sunil Joshi (now dead), Lokesh Sharma, Dange alias Parmanand and Kalasangra for hatching a criminal conspiracy which resulted in blasts in the Samjhauta Express near Deewana railway station in Haryana's Panipat district, about 80 km from Delhi.

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India-Pakistan

No credible evidence yet to act against Hafiz Saeed: Malik

2012-12-15

[The Hindu] Conceding that "non-state actors" were hampering India-Pakistain relationship, the visiting Interior Minister Rehman Malik Pak politician, Interior Minister under the Gilani government. Malik is a former Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) intelligence officer who rose to head the FIA during Benazir Bhutto's second tenure. Malik was tossed from his FIA job in 1998 after documenting the breath-taking corruption of the Sharif family. By unhappy coincidence Nawaz Sharif became PM at just that moment and Malik moved to London one step ahead of the button men. He had to give up the interior ministry job because he held dual Brit citizenship. on Friday said he would order the arrest of Hafiz Muhammad Saeed ...who would be wearing a canvas jacket with very long sleeves anyplace but Pakistain... , the criminal mastermind of the Mumbai terror attacks, the moment he got credible evidence. "We have to follow the law of the land. And of course [satisfy] the [Pak] court ... There has been a lot of propaganda about Hafiz Muhammad Saeed. I assure you that we are still investigating the [Indian] evidence. And if that evidence can stand the test of courts of international standards, I will order his arrest even before returning home. We have no love lost for Hafiz Muhammad Saeed," Mr. Malik told journalists here on arrival. He is on a three-day visit to operationalise the historic visa agreement between the two neighbours that was signed in September. Mr. Malik noted that Pakistain was receiving dossiers that had only information and no evidence. The statement of Ajmal Kasab, the Pak national and Lashkar-e-Taiba ...the Army of the Pure, an Ahl-e-Hadith terror organization founded by Hafiz Saeed. LeT masquerades behind the Jamaat-ud-Dawa facade within Pakistain and periodically blows things up and kills people in India. Despite the fact that it is banned, always an interesting concept in Pakistain, the organization remains an blatant tool and perhaps an arm of the ISI... terrorist who was hanged last month after having been convicted in the 26/11 case, on Saeed's involvement in the Mumbai attacks was not enough, he said. "It needs further corroboration ... I will make public official documents from the court's judgment where Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has been declared innocent." Referring to the execution of the gunman, he said: "When Ajmal Kasab was hanged. I was the first one to come on television and [I] gave the statement that we respect the judgments coming from your courts. Similarly when the trial is going on [in Pakistain] I have already told you that it is on fast track and of course we have gone to every level to make it on the fast track." Mr. Malik said non-state actors were playing havoc with the relationship between the two countries, both facing the scourge of terrorism for many years. "I come with a message of love and peace from the people of Pakistain. I do not want any negativity today. What I want is a positive message, positive view forward ... Let's forget the dark days, let's enter with shining stars, with smiling faces and clear hearts." The Pak Minister, however, raised the issues of Babri mosque demolition and Samjhauta train blasts. "We do not want any 9/11. We do not want any Bombay blasts, we do not want any Samjhauta Express, we do not want any Babri mosque issue and we can work together not only for peace in Pakistain and India, but also for the region." Mr. Malik said the "journey to peace is progressing very well" because of the meetings between the leaders of the two countries. For this, I must give full credit to my leader, President [Asif Ali] Zardari, the Prime Minister, and equal credit to the Prime Minister [Manmohan Singh] and [former Home Minister and now Finance Minister] P. Chidambaram."

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India-Pakistan

Samjhauta attack: Charges filed against five extremists in India

2011-06-22

[Dawn] India's anti-terror National Investigating Agency (NIA) on Monday filed charges against five alleged Hindu faceless myrmidons for the 2007 fire-bombing of the Samjhauta Express that killed 68 passengers, including 42 Paks on their way home, reports said. The move comes days ahead of a critical meeting between the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistain in Islamabad who are to discuss a raft of issues, including terrorism. The Samjhauta issue has figured prominently in bilateral talks in the past. Local reports said the NIA filed the charges, including that of criminal conspiracy and murder, in the Special Court at Panchkula in the Haryana state where the incident occurred on February 18, 2007. The accused are Naba Kumar Sarkar alias Swami Aseemanand, Sunil Joshi (now dead), Lokesh Sharma, Sandeep Dange and Ramchandra Kalasangra alias Ramji. The initial investigation was carried out by the Railway Police and the Haryana Police but on July 26 last year, India handed over the probe to the NIA, which registered the case on July 29. NIA sleuths fanned out to several parts of the country to unravel the conspiracy. The investigation, conducted over the past year, established that the conspiracy was hatched between 2005 and 2007 by Swami Aseemanand, Sunil Joshi and his associates -- Ramji, Sandeep Dange, Lokesh Sharma and others at different places in Gujarat, ...where rioting seems to be a traditional passtime... Madhya Pradesh and other states. The accused were upset at a series of attacks on Hindu temples by alleged Mohammedan bully boys. "As a result, Swami Aseemanand propounded a bomb ka badla bomb (bomb for bomb) theory. The Samjhauta Express was particularly chosen, as most of its passengers are Pak citizens. He not only provided financial and logistical support to the terror group which executed this dastardly act but also played a vital role in instigating and motivating his associates to undertake this terrorist act," the charge-sheet says. Sandeep Dange, Ramji, Lokesh Sharma and others, acting under the leadership of Sunil Joshi, were instrumental in procuring the raw materials for building Improvised Explosive Devices and getting them fabricated and planted. The investigation yielded a strong suspicion about the role of some more persons in the conspiracy and, therefore, further probe would be conducted.

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India-Pakistan

Train blasts: Hindu radical gets 14-day judicial remand

2011-01-15

[Arab News] Radical Hindu activist Swami Aseemanand, in jug for his alleged involvement in the 2007 Samjhauta Express blasts, was Thursday sent to 14-day judicial remand by a National Investigation Agency (NIA) court here. Aseemanand, who was presented before the court amid tight security, will be lodged in Ambala jail, around 35 km from here. The proceedings were held in-camera and no media person was allowed to enter the courtroom while Aseemanand was presented before the judge. The NIA special judge had sent Aseemanand to 10-day police remand on Jan 3. Besides, NIA has also filed a petition before the court to get the statements of Aseemanand recorded before a magistrate, under Code of Criminal Procedure Section 164. Court will take up this petition Jan 15. "NIA did not appeal for further remand of Aseemanand. They told the judge that Aseemanand was ready to record his statements before the judicial magistrate. My client is fully cooperating with the investigation officers," Aseemanand's lawyer Manveer Singh Rathi told news hounds. Aseemanand, a member of the right-wing Hindu group Abhinav Bharat, was brought here from Hyderabad on warrant Dec 23. He is also an accused in the 2007 Makkah Masjid blast in Hyderabad in which 14 people were killed. The NIA is questioning Aseemanand about his role in the Samjhauta Express blasts Feb 18, 2007, at Diwana village near the industrial town of Panipat, 160 km from here, in Haryana. The blasts, which killed 68 people, took place in two bogies of the Samjhauta Express, a peace train between India and Pakistain. A majority of the 68 victims were Pak nationals. The train was going from Delhi to Attari, the last station on the Indian side. The passengers were to board the Samjhauta Express train to Lahore city in Pakistain the next day (Feb. 19). Aseemanand was jugged by the Central Bureau of Investigation on Nov. 19 last year from Haridwar in Uttarakhand for his alleged role in the Makkah Masjid blast.

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India-Pakistan

India suffers from ISI phobia: Pakistan

2010-10-29

[Arab News] Foreign Office front man said here Thursday that India suffers from ISI (Inter Services Intelligence) phobia. During a weekly briefing, Abdul Basit said India is obsessed with blaming Pakistain's spy agency for any untoward incident. He said India should formally inform Pakistain regarding the progress in Samjhauta Express' probe. He said 68 people, mostly Pak nationals, were killed when bombs were set off in two coaches of the cross-country train, running between Delhi and Lahore, around midnight on Feb. 18, 2007 at Diwana near Panipat, 80 km north of Delhi. The case was being handled by Haryana Police, which had failed to make any headway after its probe led to a tailor at Indore in Madhya Pradesh who had prepared the cover for the suitcase that contained bombs. With no breakthrough in the three-year-old blast case, the Indian government has decided to hand over the inquiry to the National Investigation Agency.

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India-Pakistan

Police took my signature on a blank paper: Kasab

2009-12-26

[Dawn] Ajmal Kasab, under-trial in the Mumbai terror attacks, again denied all charges framed against him saying his signature was taken on a blank paper. He told the 26/11 trial judge M L Tahiliyani in Mumbai that his signature was taken on a blank sheet of paper by police with regard to his confessional statement. "The confession recorded by magistrate was not read out to me and it does not contain the truth," he said. He told the special Mumbai court that he did not arrive in Mumbai on a fishing trawler Kuber but by the Samjhauta Express. He also denied that he had talked to Abu Hamza on a satellite phone. "If I had talked to him, then my voice would have been recorded," he said. When asked about Abu Ismail, Kasab said, "who is he, I do not know...I was not with him."

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India-Pakistan

Qureshi: no training camps in Pakistan

2008-11-29

NEW DELHI: Visiting Pakistan Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Friday said there were no terrorist training camps in Pakistan. The country was pursing a policy of cooperation to add a new chapter in bilateral relationship with India. Kashmir was an outstanding issue on which Pakistan preferred a “peaceful, negotiated settlement.” Asked where terrorists were being trained if not in Pakistan, he said, “It is not confined to Pakistan. There have been attacks and suicides in Afghanistan, Iraq. This is an international network and has to be dealt with at an international level. It is a global issue and has to be tackled on that basis.” Interacting with the media at the India Women’s Press Corps here, Mr. Qureshi said he did not cut short his visit in the wake of the terror attacks so as to express “solidarity” and “lend support.” “I have come here to build bridges. I am equally saddened by what has happened.” Asked about India’s assertion that initial information had shown the involvement of Pakistan elements in the Mumbai attacks, Mr. Qureshi said, “How can you be so sure? You have to build trust. Without trust there can be no beginning. There are extreme and rogue elements in every society. In February the people of Pakistan spoke and rejected extreme fringe elements.” To a question, he said the Indian government should have pondered more before pointing a finger at Pakistan. “The leadership must rise above politics and domestic compulsions.” Appealing for cooperation and not accusations, he stressed the need for strengthening the anti-terrorism mechanism that had been set up between India and Pakistan. “Terrorists are barbaric and inhuman and we have to eliminate them collectively.” On what action the Pakistan government had taken against Lashkar-e-Taiba, he said, Pakistan had banned LeT. “To give a value judgment during this moment is not proper. Experience shows that there should not be a knee-jerk reaction. When the Samjhauta Express bombing happened there were a lot of accusations, but today investigations have reversed that.” Claiming that the Pakistan government was going after terrorists, he said such incidents were happening to disrupt the India-Pakistan dialogue process. He said the present government in Pakistan did not subscribe to the values of the Taliban and was looking at the curricula of all madrasas to discourage teaching of militancy.

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India-Pakistan

Politics of 'Hindu terror'

2008-11-16

By Chandan Mitra Ab Tak Chhappan! The title of this Ram Gopal Varma film easily comes to mind observing the manner in which the Maharashtra ATS is going about picking up people all over India and slapping them into the cooler on a daily basis, ostensibly in a bid to unearth dimensions of "Hindu terror". We have lost count of the number of persons interrogated, sent on police or judicial remand, their brains penetrated with narcotic substances to induce confession to their "crimes". But not a day has passed, since Sadhvi Pragya was nabbed some 25 days ago, without somebody or the other being arrested, allegedly in connection with a fantastic plot conjured up by the Maharashtra Police. Those arrested included serving and retired Army officers, school and college teachers, political activists and now even a resourceful sadhu. Every evening at the news meeting in our office, the first question asked is, "What's the score today? Ab tak ...?" Buoyed by enthusiastic endorsement from the "secular" media, which is gleefully eating out of the ATS' hands, the so-called Hindu terror plot keeps assuming an ever-growing magnitude. Not content with pinning the blame for the minor bomb blasts in Malegaon and Modasa, then Nanded and later Kanpur, the ATS' ambitions have increased manifold. Currently, it is busy trying to implicate the same group in the 2006 Samjhauta Express blasts. Curiously, SIMI commander Safdar Nagori's narco tests have resulted in a confession that his organisation executed the Samjhauta bombings. Does this mean that so-called Hindu terrorists have been synchronising their moves with SIMI? Or, maybe ATS will tomorrow come up with a theory that "Hindu terrorists" have been funding and masterminding the actions of jihadis who innocently fell into the Hindu trap in the lure of money. Far fetched? Not really, if you consider the gigantic yarns being spun around the purported confessions of the detained suspects. Interestingly, in the last seven days, contradictory "leaks" have been planted on the handpicked media about the responses of detained suspects. A particularly hilarious story front-paged by a leading national daily claimed that the narco-analysis of Sadhvi Pragya came to a naught because she meditates daily! Apparently, those who are ardent practitioners of that spiritual art become immune to narco tests because their mental powers are strong enough to resist drug-induced coercion aimed at extracting confessions. Moral of the story: All criminals ought to mediate, for then narco-tests shall fail and they go scot-free! By the way, it would be interesting to know if the servants arrested in the Arushi Talwar murder case were also trained in the art of meditation. Must be, for the CBI failed to get any information out of them and finally they had to be released. Similarly, Lt Col. Srikant Purohit, too, foiled the investigators' desperate attempts to cajole him into confessing his crime because, we are told, as an Armyman, he was trained to absorb stress and no amount of drugs got him to talk. Halted on their tracks, the ATS then leaked purported details of Purohit's confessions, which were eagerly lapped up by sections of the media to further their campaign to equate "Hindu" with jihadi terror. Following the arrest of Swami Amritanand aka Dayanand Pandey or Sudhakar Dwivedi, we were treated to details of his past, website photos, his ashrams, connections with top national personalities, ex-President APJ Abdul Kalam downwards. But what we never got to know was his role in the Malegaon blasts. Within hours of his arrest, the Haryana Railway Police swooped down on him apparently to discover his link to the Samjhauta Express blasts, which self-confessedly, SIMI had carried out. Without a shred of evidence to that effect, he has already been awarded the epithet of "Terror Guru". In the same way, the highly respected Bhonsala Military School has been dubbed a terror factory - a term used hitherto for Talibanised madrasas. Merely because some members of a little known outfit called Abhinav Bharat, an adjunct of the largely defunct Hindu Mahasabha, visited the premises of the school, its custodians were hounded to the point of putting in their papers. Judging by the hype accompanying the "Hindu terror" revelations, it would appear that nothing else is happening in this country for the last month or so. With every passing day, the ATS' concoctions get more incredible, the scale of "leaked" stories magnified and the media's tone becomes predictably shriller. All this before any of the arrested persons is formally charged or given an opportunity to defend themselves. Wasn't it the Congress that kept cautioning us against trial by media? Wasn't it Manmohan Singh who plaintively lamented that everything in this country gets politicised? But when a trial by the media is actually sponsored by the Government and agencies under its control, like the Maharashtra ATS, nobody sees anything wrong with it. That, in the process, even the Army is being hauled over the coals and its exalted status sullied beyond repair is of no consequence. Clearly, the Government thinks tarnishing the Army serves its short-term agenda: Putting BJP on the backfoot. Nothing is too sacrosanct to achieve that aim in an election year. In the face of mounting public anger against the UPA's all-round failure, especially its vote-bank politics over terrorism, the Government desperately needed a face-saver. So, they decided to construct an elaborate theory of all-pervasive Hindu terror hoping to convince the electorate that the Hindutva forces are the real fountainhead of all terrorist activities. It is a matter of time before it is volubly argued by "secular" politicians and their media cheerleaders that jihadi terror is nothing but an act of self-defence in the face of rampant "Hindu terrorist" provocation. With investigating agencies dragging their feet (could it be under orders from above?), failing to convict any terror accused so far, this is a clever ploy to divert attention from the real danger jihadi terror poses to India. Determined to thwart efforts by BJP-ruled States to introduce tough anti-terror laws, the Government has directed the President to return Narendra Modi's proposed GUJCOC, drafted on the lines of MCOCA, which is operational in UPA-ruled Maharashtra. And the Centre is equally determined not to execute Afzal Guru despite the Supreme Court sentencing him to death several years back. Incidentally, Muslim-majority Indonesia has fewer qualms: It executed three Islamic radicals last week, soon after they were convicted for the Bali bombings. But our Government is focused on damning Hindu organisations by a sustained campaign of calumny. I wonder if the Maharashtra ATS will soon "unearth" global linkages of Hindu terror and accuse some sadhvi, swami or an Army officer of having plotted 9/11 too! What the Congress-led Government is failing to recognise is that public anger against a regime increasingly seen as decidedly anti-Hindu, is rising. In the process, the Congress may actually be helping to create a Hindu vote for the first time in India's history. Pyromaniacs often end up being consumed by the very fire they light

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India-Pakistan

Blast Investigation Focuses on Hindu ‘Terror Conspiracy’

2008-11-16

NEW DELHI - More arrests are expected in the coming weeks as the frightening dimensions of a Hindu terror plot start to unravel, with investigators indicating that it had the makings of a larger conspiracy and planning of reprisal killings of Muslims for serial bombings in a number of Indian cities. Ten people, including a self-proclaimed Hindu seer and a serving lieutenant colonel, have so far been arrested for the September 29 bombing in a Muslim-dominated neighbourhood in the small Maharashtra town of Malegaon that killed five people. Investigators are now examining if a Hindu terror conspiracy was involved in several other blasts -- like the one of the Samjhauta Express train in 2007 -- that have till date remained unsolved. The Anti-Terrorism Squad's (ATS) arrest of Mahant Amritanand Dev alias Dayanand Pandey, the self-styled pontiff from Kanpur, which investigators say is a "prize catch", has already admitted that it was under his instructions that Lt. Colonel Shrikant Purohit procured RDX from an army depot that was used in the Malegaon blast. "Pandey was present in all the pre-blast meetings in Bhopal, Jabalpur and Faridabad, monitored operations meticulously and was also responsible for arranging the finances that came in through illegal channels," an ATS source told IANS.

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India-Pakistan

Violent agitations styming India By M.V. Kamath

2008-06-24

On May 31, 2008, a massive gathering of Muslims was held at the historic Ram Lila Ground in Delhi, led by clerics who issued a fatwa against terrorism, which was unanimously accepted. This is a major development, whose significance cannot be under-estimated. The fatwa is especially relevant coming as it does from the Dar-ul-Uloom, India’s most respected Islamic seminary. If one understands its meaning, it is that there are no longer any takers for the jihadi agenda of outside elements within the Muslim community in India which will henceforth work on the theory that its destiny is irrevocably linked with the land of their birth. So far so good. But there are Muslims and Muslims. There are elements among Muslims who take their orders from Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI). There are blind followers of the United Jihad Council (UJC) whose chief, Syed Salahuddin, stationed in Pakistan recently called for renewed offensive against India and openly urged cadres to advance the cause of jihad in Kashmir. Then we have followers of the Bangladesh-based Harkatul Jihadi-e-Islami (HUJI) and the banned Students Islamic Movement of India(SIMI) both of which have been very active in recent times. The terror challenge has become all the more serious following reports that Pakistan’s ISI has made Dawood Ibrahim’s gang ‘D-company’ to merge with the Lashkar-e-Taiba terror network. It is well-known that Dawood’s gang has a formidable smuggling network in India but Pakistan still refuses to hand over the gangster to India on the plea that his presence in the country is not verifiable. According to M.K.Narayan, National Security Adviser, India’s high-value oil assets are being targeted by an unholy nexus of the underworld and terrorist groups such as the Jaish-e-Mohammad. Interestingly, the entire Dawood Ibrahim family, according to reports has been awarded high educational qualifications by the ISI to facilitate fake travel documents and visas. Pakistan’s duplicity become evident when it is noted that it has released the Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar from house-arrest and lifted restraint on the Lashkar. Meanwhile, let it be noted that in the thirteen major blasts since August 2003, about 560 people have been killed and more than thrice the number have been wounded, a clear testimony that terrorism is not yet dead in the country, but, on the other hand, is very much alive. The law moves slowly. It took the country nearly 14 years to get convictions in the 1993 Bombay blasts. There have been virtually no break-throughs in cases of terrorist attacks in Malegaon (September 2006), Samjhauta Express (February 2007), Mecca Masjid, Hyderabad (May 2007), Gokul Chat and Lumbini Park, Hyderabad (August 2007) and the serial bombings in U.P. courts (November 2007). The cycle bombings in Jaipur cost at least 63 lives, forget the number of people injured. All these were professionally planned and it is clear that the terrorists have enough manpower in the country to back their murderous activities. No doubt, the Grand Mufti of Deoband’s Dar-ul-Uloom, Habibur Rehman is aware of all this and feels frustrated. He has taken the first step; the next step is to establish an anti-terrorist network throughout the country and report suspects to the police without delay. Muslim patriots alone can do that; intelligence agencies have their limitations. But the worst enemies of the country are our secularists who would rather turn a blind eye to terrorism then act swiftly to contain it. The Supreme Court had decreed that Mohammad Afzal, the man involved in the murderous attack on Parliament should be hanged. But the UPA government with one eye on the Muslim vote bank has been reluctant to implement law. The condemned man has had enough of solitary confinement and would prefer to be executed and is praying for L.K.Advani to be the next Prime Minister; but the self-styled secularists seem to believe that that would offend Muslim sentiment. Afzal is a criminal who has been found guilty. One may be against capital punishment, but that is another matter. Not to obey the Supreme Court is to show cowardice and fear of Islamic fundamentalists. We have had enough of secularist double talk. If the government does not implement the Supreme Court decision, what is the Supreme Court for? The time has come to take this matter of minorities seriously. We must stop dividing the country along these lines. It hasn’t in the least helped Muslims. On the other hand they have for all purposes been marginalised because the whole lot has been taken to be sworn enemies of India. In part they have to accept blame because they wanted to be treated as minorities. There are no minorities in India. There are only people. One of the most sensible thing that the BJP government in Karnataka did was to co-opt a leading Muslim into the cabinet. And he has already shown his courage by exposing corruption in handling of wakf properties. But a more urgent problem is facing the country and that is the recourse to violence taken by people over the silliest of issues. The Gujjars have done incalculable harm to themselves and the country by their behaviour. Their leaders should have been arrested, tried and sentenced to rigourous imprisonment. It is shocking to learn that India’s Corporate Sector has lost over Rs.5,300 crore since May 23 due to Gujjar stir, apart from cancellation of at least 75 trains by the railways. The losses are in addition to the physical damage done to train tracks. Violence should never be tolerated for howsoever right a cause it is supposedly resorted to and punishment must be swift, adequate and drastic. The damage done to public transport in Hubli-Dharwar because shops selling fertilisers had gone out of stock is shocking. It is now believed that Congressmen were behind this vile exhibition of violence. The idea, apparently, was to embarrass the newly established BJP government right from the start. People take to violence at the slightest or no provocation because it has become the accepted thing in politics, whether at Singur in West Bengal or Samba in Kashmir. That it is not and it must be impressed on every section of society, including Congress adherents. Public property is sacrosanct and anybody who damages it must be made to pay for it by the heaviest punishment possible. It is time our people learn to behave like adults. India is not for burning. And anybody who indulges in it should know that they will not be spared.

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