Tuesday evening’s “despicable and dastardly” terrorist attack on Rajasthan’s capital city is a grim reminder that no state government can afford to be complacent about terrorism. India has to come to terms with the unfortunate reality that every region of the country, every state, city and town, and even village, is vulnerable to terrorism, and particularly when an attack is least expected.
Nothing can be taken for granted any more in devising counter-terrorism strategies and operations. Indeed, the Jaipur incident, which claimed at least 60 lives (the count could rise) and injured to some 200 innocent citizens, compels a harder and deeper look at the existing strategies in order to fine-tune them more realistically.
The first-time attack on the Pink City tells us that terrorists are well-entrenched and command local logistics, material, moral and financial support, thanks to which they are able to mount meticulously-planned operations and carry them out with professional finesse. The terrorist outfits have spread themselves out in many states and are now part of a well-knit organisation with resources and special expertise, apparently interacting regularly with one another. The list of states that have experienced terrorism is growing longer by the year: one can count on fingertips the states unvisited by terror during the past decade.
Hence, the Union home ministry’s call for a nationwide high alert as an immediate response to the event is warranted. The eight blasts that selectively unleashed mayhem on Jaipur’s most crowded areas, like temples, shopping venues and tourist attractions, followed the pattern of earlier strikes in Varanasi, Mumbai and Hyderabad. The inference is, therefore, that the attack could be the handiwork of the Jaish-e-Mohammed and/or the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, based in Pakistan and trained and funded by its Inter-Services Intelligence, with logistics support from the Students’ Islamic Movement of India and the Bangladesh-based Harkut-ul-Jehadi Islami (HuJI).
The DGP of Rajasthan has said that there had been no intelligence warning of the impending serial blasts. This is likely to be the story in every attack by these outfits because the surprise element assures them maximum civilian casualties. This is why every terrorist attack is despicable, but then, terrorism subscribes to no human values. The Centre needs to proceed on the assumption that an attack is imminent anywhere and strategise accordingly.
The BJP, predictably, has held the Centre’s “soft” approach to terrorism responsible for Tuesday’s tragedy. Such political exploitation of a human tragedy is extremely cynical. After all, Rajasthan is now ruled by a BJP government, and is it not true that terrorism was a regular visitor even when the NDA ruled the country? Terrorism is the common enemy of all governments and all peoples.
