varnam

Continuing from where we left off yesterday, The Acorn points to a piece by Praveen Swamy

what evidence is available, though, suggests that the tactics and techniques used in the Mumbai bombings are similar to those deployed in the wave of strikes that have taken place across India since the end of 2005. Fabricated from easily-available chemicals such as potassium permanganate or aluminium chlorate, with small amounts of RDX to accelerate the detonation, the kinds of explosives that seem to have been used in Mumbai are easy to manufacture — and lethal when used in crowded locations.

If recent experience is a guide, investigators are likely to find that the real architects of the bombing are outside its reach: the Lashkar is headquartered at Muridke, near Lahore, while the HuJI operates out of bases in Dhaka and Chittagong. More likely than not, though, the operation will have been facilitated by local operatives of these terror groups — part of a subterranean but still enormously dangerous movement of small numbers of recruits into the ranks of Islamist terror groups.

Update 1: According to the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh (not Sonia Gandhi), India will win the war on terror. Terrorists must be surrendering in droves after hearing his pathetic speech.

Update 2: Mumbai Politician suspected?

He, however, dodged a query on a media report that claimed a south Mumbai politician, who has considerable clout in a minority community, was under the scanner of intelligence agencies for his suspected role in yesterday's serial blasts in suburban trains.

The report quoted intelligence sources as saying that the politician could have instigated the blasts in retaliation for a recent strife in a minority-dominated area of Thane district.

Update 3: Premature to blame LeT

The director general of police in Maharashtra, the Indian state that includes Mumbai, said that officers had �??no concrete evidence�?� to implicate Lashkar-e-Toiba, an Islamic militant organization that is fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, a mostly Muslim state that is also claimed, and is partly occupied, by Pakistan.

But the director general, P. S. Pasricha, said �??the modus operandi does suggest their involvement.�?� The organization and scale of the attacks, the type of explosive involved and the use of remote control devices all suggested that Lashkar-e-Toiba may have been involved, perhaps in conjunction with local groups, he said.

�??Parcel train mey chhodke sab Malad mey milengey.�?� Sandeep Singh, a Ghatkopar resident in his mid-20s, overheard this seemingly innocuous piece of conversation between three men outside the Churchgate station at 5.30 pm on Tuesday. It was only after he reached home (around 7 pm) and switched on the television that he realised the full implications of the conversation he had eavesdropped on.

According to Singh�??s statement, two of the three men had been bearded and were wearing Pathan suits. All three were carrying similar-looking parcels which looked like gift boxes.

Update 6: What previously captured terrorists have told could give clues

Central intelligence agencies believe that the serial blasts in Mumbai were most likely triggered by Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), acting on the direction of Pakistan�??s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

An official source said inputs about the re-emergence of the ISI hand have come from miscreants arrested in connection with recent terrorist strikes in north India.

Those in custody have told interrogators that they were taken across the border to Karachi and then sent to training camps in Baluchistan, after which they were sent back to India to await orders.

The Mumbai Police on Wednesday claimed a major headway in the serial train blasts probe with the preparation of over half a dozen sketches of suspects involved in Tuesday's blasts, sources said.

"The sketches have been prepared after getting details from an eyewitness and scores of persons injured in the blast," a senior crime branch official told PTI in Mumbai.

The sketches are unlikely to be released to public to maintain confidentiality of the probe, sources added.