New terror trend disturbs India

NEW DELHI, March 10 (UPI) -- Indian intelligence agencies are disturbed by a new terror trend that has revealed the use of local people and explosives to carry out blasts, Indian strategic affairs analysts said Friday.

The Varanasi bomb blasts have established the fact that local militant modules are well entrenched in areas outside the disputed Kashmir province.

"A new trend of terrorism that has come to light after two blasts in Varanasi has disturbed the intelligence and counter intelligence agencies, as militant outfits are now using local agents then their own cadres to carry out terror strikes," said Ajai Sahni, executive director of Institute of Conflict Management, a Delhi based strategic affairs think tank.

Sahni said the bombs planted at two locations in Varanasi were primarily made of widely available aluminum nitrate and not RDX, which has to be smuggled from outside India.

He said militants seem to have altered their strategy, as they are now using locally made explosives rather than RDX.

Sahni said that the bombers were, in all probability, all Indians, and a new concept of terrorism has clearly established itself in the Indian hinterland.

Terrorists struck Tuesday on the holy city of Varanasi in the northern Indian province of Uttar Pradesh as two bombs exploded, in Sankat Mochan temple and the railway station, killing at least 14 people and injuring over 60.

A hitherto-unknown terror outfit called Lashkar-e-Qahar (Army of the Imperious) claimed the responsibility for the twin blasts. "We want to warn the Indian government and Indian public that we are capable of carrying out more such acts at will," said Abdul Jabbar, alias Abu Qahar, a spokesman of the militant group.

He said Lashkar-e-Qahar was responsible for the Varanasi bomb blasts.

"Unless the Indians stop inflicting atrocities in Kashmir and give up their tyrannical measures, including random arrests of innocent people, we would continue to carry out more bomb blasts," he told a Srinagar-based news agency.

The Indian intelligence and security agencies in New Delhi and Srinagar doubted the claim of the caller. Agency sleuths say they have not come across any such terror group.

"This (bombing) was an attempt of Lashkar-e-Toiba because the modus-operandi is typical of LeT style," said a senior unidentified intelligence bureau official.

He said LeT has used such tactics in the past to mislead the investigation. The special task force investigating the Varanasi blasts said the evidence they have gathered indicates that the blasts may have been carried out by a LeT module led by Mohammed Saleem, who was killed near Lucknow just few hours after the blasts.

"Lashkar-e-Qahar has not been heard of before," said K. Rajendra Kumar, inspector general of police (Kashmir range), adding "our information is that no such group ever existed in Kashmir."

What is disturbing the investigating and security agencies is the possibility that LeT has changed its strategy. The dreaded terror outfit now selects its target months in advance and has the operation executed by locals, who are either hired or recruited.

This is an alarming situation because it shows that LeT has expanded its network outside Kashmir. The arrest of Mohammed Saleem, an Indian, has underscored this new concept of terrorism.

Saleem, who was a small time thief in Ratlam in central Madhya Pradesh province, joined LeT few years ago. He was assigned with the task of recruiting locals in Muslim majority areas of Uttar Pradesh.

Saleem, the agencies say, stayed in Muslim majority western and eastern Uttar Pradesh for over two months and recruited three locals. With the help of the three new recruits and two local criminals, he successfully carried out the attacks.

The Uttar Pradesh police, who released sketches of two of the bombers, have now admitted that they don't have any evidence to link the terrorist killed in Lucknow on Wednesday with the blasts. Intelligence bureau investigators identified Saleem.

Lack of coordination between federal and state intelligence agencies and irregular exchanges of information have also been making the militants' task easy.

Indian investigators do not know Lashkar-e-Qahar, and are not attaching much significance to the claims made by the organization. Rather they believe that LeT has created several modules comprising of locals and trained them in explosives. These modules continue to cause havoc, mostly targeted at symbols of India's resurgence, like information technology and religious places.

Meanwhile, a LeT spokesman has denied that the outfit has any links with the new group that claimed responsibility. "There isn't any jihadi organization in Pakistan or in Jammu and Kashmir with the name of Lashkar-e-Qahar," said Yahaya Mujahid, an official of Pakistan-based LeT.

He said the word Qahar means doom and Lashkar-e-Qahar means the army that brings doom. He said Qahar must be an indigenous jihadi group based in India, and might be using the world Lashkar just to confuse the Indian security agencies.

Indian security agencies have been tracking several possible links to the Varanasi blasts, including links between Islamist jihadis in Bangladesh. LeT generally uses Bangladesh for the supply of RDX. The security and intelligence services were taken aback in this case when it was established that RDX was not used.

If LeT were indeed responsible, it will mark the first time LeT has not used RDX to carry out explosions.

Instead, locally made explosives and local recruits were used, which has caused a serious concern for Indian intelligence agencies. They now have to work out a different strategy to stop this new terror concept spreading further.