Mumbai sees return of a familiar
fear By Dinesh Sharma
Close to the fifth anniversary of the
terror attacks on Mumbai trains that killed 181
people on July 11, 2006, India's "maximum city", a
fluid epicenter of Indian modernity, ambitions and
chaotic dreams, was hit again by three serial
bombings on July 13, 2011. While the raw surge of
the life-force in Mumbai is much stronger than the
death instinct, one has to wonder how many more
terrorist attacks the city can withstand without
losing its heart.
As former Indian
president Abdul Kalam has said, "In India we only
read about death, sickness, terrorism and crime."
Indeed, this is the sadness many are expressing on
the day after the attacks, and just three years
after the carnage of the massive November 2008
militant assault on the city.
How long can
Mumbai remain resilient in the face of such
attacks? Does helplessness
set in at some point? Are Mumbai dwellers driven
by the sheer compulsion to block out the repeated
attacks? Some hard policy and intelligence
questions have to be answered for Indians to truly
feel safe again.
Suspected to be the work
of Indian Mujahideen, a shadow group associated
with Students Islamic Movement of India and
Pakistan's Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), the terrorists
detonated three coordinated bombs at Zaveri Bazar,
Opera House and Kabootar Khanna, Dadar. At the
crowded financial district, well known for its 150
years old diamond and jewelry hub, maximum lives
were injured and lost due to the evening rush
hour.
The bombs went off in the span of 15
minutes from 6.45 pm to 7.00 pm, killing 17 people
and injuring 141. The victims were rushed to
several local area trauma units, JJ, St George and
GT hospitals.
Two Indian Mujahideen
operatives, who had been picked up earlier this
week in connection with the Gujarat attacks of
2008, might be able to provide potential leads.
These suspects have been identified as 32-year-old
Mohammed Mobin Abdul Shakoor Khan alias Irfan and
his 28-year-old cousin, Ayub Raja Amin Shaikh.
But many critics of the current government
are asking why have the perpetrators not been
brought to a trial five years after the crime? Is
justice moving slowly or being obstructed by
human-rights groups, Indian social observers are
asking?
As the blasts tore through the
windows of the jewelry and diamonds district, one
shop owner could not differentiate between the
shattered pieces of glass and the uncut diamonds
flying through the showroom, hitting and injuring
his face. Another store attendant was thrown back
on the floor from the sheer force of the blast
with precious stones, jewelry, and gold strewn all
over the narrow and congested storefront. Indians
are wondering why the terrorists repeatedly attack
India's financial nerve center, heavily populated
with rich Gujarati businessmen?
Mumbai and
other major cities were put on high alert, as
India's investigative agencies - National
Investigative Agencies and National Security
Guards went to work.
Improvised explosives
devices (IEDs) with timers and shrapnel were used
to carry out the attacks, similar to previous
Mumbai attacks but more sophisticated than the
makeshift device used by the failed New York Time
Square bomber. Evidence collected from the blast
site indicated that RDX and ammonium nitrate were
used in the explosions.
As the evening
monsoon rains began to wash away the dusty
congested streets, the agencies scurried to
salvage the remaining bits of evidence - charred
pieces of human flesh, blood and hair, mangled
with parts of a motorcycle and automotive engine,
and children's broken toys blasted through the
rear window of a parked car. The evidence was sent
to the National Security Guards laboratory hub for
forensic testing, set-up after the 2008 attacks in
the suburbs of Andheri.
Mumbai dwellers
have grown accustomed to the coordinated terrorist
attacks in real life and in their docudramas,
wrecking many lives, families and communities, all
the while fueling a dark Bollywood genre about the
heavy toll of terrorism on the inner world of
Hindus and Muslims, who live side-by-side in the
densely populated urban jungle of this most
cosmopolitan city.
Movies like
Roja, Bombay, Maachis,
Sarfarosh, Black Friday, Dil
Se, Mission Kashmir, Wednesday,
Aamir, Kurbaan and New York
are just few of the recent examples of Bollywood's
obsession with terrorism and Hindu-Muslim communal
violence. When you look at the list of repeated
attacks, alongside the movie production of terror
based films coming out of Bollywood, it does not
take a genius to make the connection between art
and social reality:
On March 12, 1993, 13 coordinated bomb
explosions killed 257 people and injured 700,
believed to be retaliation for the Babri Masjid
demolition.
On December 6, 2002, near Ghatkopar station in
Gujarat, a blast killed two and injured 28, on the
10th anniversary of the Babri Masjid events.
On January 27, 2003, a bicycle bomb exploded
near the Vile Parle station in Mumbai, killing one
person and injuring 25, a day before prime
minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was to visit the
city.
On March 13, 2003, a bomb exploded near the
Mulund station in Mumbai, a day after the 10th
anniversary of the 1993 Bombay bombings, killing
10 people and injuring 70.
On July 28, 2003, again a blast near Ghatkopar
station in Gujarat killed 4 people and injured 32.
On August 25, 2003, coordinated bombs exploded
near the Gateway of India and at the Zaveri Bazaar
in Kalbadevi, killing 44 people and injuring 150.
On July 11, 2006, within the span of eleven
minutes seven bombs exploded on the Suburban
Railway in Mumbai, killing 209 people, including
22 foreigners, and injuring 700.
On November 27, 2008, more than 10 attacks and
bombings, including the attacks on the Taj Hotel,
killing 164 and injuring 308. One early theory
suggests that the attacks are linked to the lone
survivor of the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, Ajmal Kasab.
Having confessed his crimes, he is sitting in a
jail facing the death penalty.
From the
nature of the attacks, locations, timing and
device, Indian authorities believe this may be the
work of Indian Mujahideen with assistance from the
LeT. The Indian Mujahideen are against Hindu
nationalists, support al-Qaeda's agenda, and
believe Indian society is violent towards and
blocks socio-economic opportunities for Indian
Muslims.
It is an open question whether
the wider terrorist network in South Asia
involving the LeT, which is known to have
terrorist links with Pakistan's Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI) and al-Qaeda, had a hand in the
planning.
While it is too early to tell
who planned the attacks, intelligence agencies
have suggested a link between Indian Mujahideen
with LeT's "Karachi Project", which relies on
fugitive Indian jihadis and is run by retired
Pakistani officers. The aim is to keep India
off-balance, while increasing Pakistan's
deniability because Indian Mujahideen operatives
for the most part are based in India. This project
was recently revealed by David Headley to US
Federal Bureau of Investigation interrogators.
In December 2009, the FBI accused Headley
of planning the massive 2008 Mumbai attacks; of
providing material support to the LeT and aiding
in the murder of American citizens. Headley, who
pleaded guilty to 12 counts, faces life in prison
and a hefty fine.
The role of the Mumbai
underworld and their transnational network has
also not been ruled out. Writing from an
international perspective, Brahma Chellaney of the
Center for Policy Research has claimed that every
coordinated attack paints India as an unsafe
business destination, leading to extraction of
investments to safer shores. This is exactly what
the terrorists, who hate India, would like to see
in both the short and long term.
"The ugly
truth is that transnational terrorists see India
as an easy target because it imposes no costs on
them and their sponsors. What India needs is a
concerted, sustained campaign against the forces
of terror. But what a succession of leaders have
offered are only words to comfort the nation,"
stated Chellaney.
The calls for a strong
anti-terror measure have generated political
infighting. Congress Party's Rahul Gandhi has
claimed that it is difficult to stop every
terrorist attack, while 99% of the attacks since
26/11 have been prevented due to vigilance and
intelligence. This invited a response from the
opposition, which called out young Gandhi's
remarks as emboldening the terrorists.
The
fact that Mumbai got hit again within a span of
three years and the US has safeguarded its home
security since 9/11 is the immediate comparison
most Indians draw. In the minds of Mumbai
dwellers, India seems weak despite recent growth,
while US is strong even with a slumping economy.
Indian officials may also be taking their cues
from the US and giving a measured response by not
blaming Pakistan directly, especially, in light of
the anticipated visit by US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton in a matter of days.
The
fact remains that the all of the masterminds of
the earlier 26/11 attacks on Mumbai are still at
large. Despite international pressures, Pakistan
has not reined them in. Testimony in the Chicago
trial of Headley, which the US media hardly
covered, it was revealed that officers of the ISI
helped the LeT fund and plan that maritime assault
on Mumbai.
While the recent attacks are
not anything like the attacks from three years
ago, it is likely they are a recruiting tactic
used by groups associated with the LeT within
India. "That whole crew from the 2008 Mumbai
attacks is still sitting there ... They haven't
done anything big since then. This could be a
testing of the waters. It's worth remembering that
there were a number of smaller attacks in the
buildup to Mumbai," according to a report from
ProPublica.
In the post-Osama bin Laden
world, including the pressures on Pakistan from
the US such as the withdrawal of $800 million aid
and greater calls for accountability from the ISI
in the killing of Pakistani journalists such as
Asia Times Online's Pakistan bureau chief Syed
Saleem Shazhad, it is likely that LeT and its
affiliates have been itching for an attack. India
is an easier target. Pakistani officials of course
are denying any knowledge of terrorists groups who
may be involved, while some of the US policy think
tanks are exploring this linkage openly.
These attacks will likely sprinkle some
cold monsoon showers on the otherwise stagnant
India-Pakistan relations that were showing some
signs of movement with the June 24 visit of Indian
Foreign Secretary Rao to Pakistan. Depending on
the results of the investigation into the attacks,
it could cause the next set of talks scheduled for
August to be delayed indefinitely.
How
much longer can we expect Mumbai dwellers to pick
themselves up, dust themselves off, and keep
moving ahead as they have done for decades?
Resiliency might slowly turn into helplessness and
compulsion. As former British premier Tony Blair
has said, "This is not a battle between the United
States of America and terrorism, but between the
free and democratic world and terrorism," which
offers the only glimmer of hope that the Indian
enterprise may not be so easily derailed by the
serial explosions.
Dinesh Sharma
is the author of Barack Obama in Hawaii and
Indonesia: the Making of a Global President
(ABC-CLIO/Praeger, 2011).
(Copyright 2011
Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights
reserved. Please contact us about sales,
syndication and
republishing.)
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
