However, this would be alarming news for the United States and its Nato allies who believe the Taliban and other militants would get a free hand to infiltrate across the border into Afghanistan and attack their soldiers once the Pakistan Army troops are pulled out from the tribal areas. Pakistan has deployed some 120,000 troops in the tribal and settled areas of NWFP since late 2003 to fight against homegrown Taliban militants and Al Qaeda-linked foreign fighters drawn from a number of Arab and Central Asian countries. Islamabad would be hoping that its move to pull out some troops from its western border with Afghanistan would prompt the U.S. and its western allies to put enough pressure on India to refrain from an attack on targets in Pakistan. Otherwise, Pakistan would put an end to military operations against Taliban and Al Qaeda in the tribal areas and focus attention on the eastern border with India.

Pakistan made the move following reports that Indian government was planning to deploy troops in Rajasthan near the border with Pakistan's Sindh province. The Pakistani troops were put on 24-hour high alert; all their leave was cancelled and army reservists were ordered to report to their old units. Though some reassuring statements came out of New Delhi from the ruling Congress party leaders, there was a view in Islamabad that Pakistan should not take chances following reports about the possibility of 'surgical airstrikes' by India on targets in Pakistan.

Eid, Holi, Christmas and New Year in normal times bring happiness and a sense of fulfillment. But people in the subcontinent were living in an abnormal situation and there was apprehension instead of joy on these festive occasions this time. The general feeling in Pakistan was that anything can happen as a consequence of the unprecedented assault on India's financial hub.

Mercifully, both Indian and Pakistani leadership has acted sensibly until now and, apart from occasional outbursts, has refrained from beating the war drums. In fact, the two sides are claiming not to have resorted to 'war hysteria' though this hasn't stopped some of them from accusing each other of displaying exactly the kind of jingoistic behaviour. One could draw comfort from the thought that this was being done for the consumption of public opinion. In particular, India as an aggrieved party has to show belligerence as its Congress party-led government is under tremendous political pressure both from the opposition parties such as the Hindu nationalist BJP and the general public to avenge the Mumbai attacks. It must be seen to be doing something to achieve this objective as failure to do so could damage its credibility and deprive it of votes in the upcoming parliamentary elections.

From the statements being made by some Indian government functionaries, one gets the impression that they are losing patience with Pakistan. Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee's declaration that all options were open in dealing with Pakistan was seen as a threat of war in Islamabad. The subsequent increase in surveillance flights by the Indian and Pakistani Air Force near their long border was unnerving even if the media thought it fit to report it as a patriotic event showing the war-preparedness of their military and the outpouring of public support for the armed forces. In fact, sections of the media in both countries have been acting irresponsibly in promoting confrontation rather than calming down the tension-filled situation. Though Pakistan downplayed the alleged violation of its airspace on two separate occasions by Indian warplanes in the third week of December by terming it accidental, the incident showed how easily such situation could deteriorate if not handled properly.

It is obvious that India, on its own and through the other world powers, particularly the U.S., is keen to put enough pressure on Pakistan to take action against militant organisations that have made no secret of their ambition to liberate Jammu and Kashmir and harm Indian interests. As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made it clear on December 23, Pakistan has to act to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure operating on its soil, one that threatened India and other neighbouring countries. Pakistan swiftly complied with the UN Security Council Resolution 1267 calling on member countries to designate the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) as a terrorist organisation having links with Al Qaeda and Taliban. Richard Barret, coordinator of the Security Council's sanctions monitoring committee, reported that Islamabad had satisfactorily implemented all decisions against terrorist groups.

However, India would like Pakistan to do more. It seeks extradition of some 20 people charged with terrorist activities in Mumbai and other Indian cities and now allegedly hiding in Pakistan. It also wants Pakistan to completely shut down anti-India organisations like JuD, its former militant wing Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-i-Mohammad.

The former U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and other American officials, following their visits to New Delhi and Islamabad, were hopeful that India and Pakistan would not go to war despite the fact that the Mumbai incident had stoked tension between the two distrustful neighbours. But given the mutual suspicions about each other's intentions, people of India and Pakistan remain worried about the fallout of the Mumbai attacks. There are still certain factors that could drive emotions and spark another round of fighting in this part of the world. India and Pakistan have fought three wars, or three and a half, if one were to include the Kargil misadventure authored by former Pakistani ruler General Pervez Musharraf, and the thought of going to war again is most terrible for the mass of humanity inhabiting the Indo-Pak subcontinent.

Journalist colleagues in India have told this writer that they have never seen such raw emotion of both anger and helplessness among the Indian people in the past. To be certain, they consider Pakistan to be the place of origin of most attacks taking place in India, but their anger is also directed against their own ruling elite. The failure of the Indian government and security forces to prevent terrorist attacks such as the one on November 26 in Mumbai and the inept manner in which the crisis was handled has angered most Indians against their rulers. The public criticism of the government functionaries, intelligence agencies, police and other law-enforcement agencies was perhaps never so strident and sustained.

It is, therefore, not surprising to see this anger getting directed at Pakistan, whose past policies no doubt contributed to radicalisation of its own society but which is also a convenient scapegoat for neighbouring countries where governments desperately need to hide their own shortcomings and failures. That they think Pakistan is the villain was borne out by the findings of a recent poll taken by a private Indian television channel. It showed that over 90 per cent of those polled wanted India to attack Pakistan to avenge the Mumbai assault. Politicians, particularly those in power with an eye on the next elections, cannot ignore public sentiment. For the Congress-led coalition government, public opinion is all the more crucial due to the typically belligerent stand taken by the Hindu nationalist BJP, which has called for action against Pakistan to 'avenge the repeated terror attacks.'

It is obvious that the ruling Congress would not let it go just like that after having publicly accused the Pakistan-based militant outfit, LeT, of involvement in the Mumbai attacks. In case any direct action against LeT is not possible, and that seems to be the situation at this stage, India would surely look into ways of making Pakistan pay the price for the incident. There has been talk of aerial strikes against the headquarters of the banned LeT and the JuD in Muridke, at a distance of about 30 kilometres from Lahore. However, this will be an act of aggression against Pakistan and would have serious consequences. The Pakistani media and experts were also concerned that India could carry out some surgical aerial strikes in Pakistani Kashmir, where the LeT camp was raided and sealed by the police near Muzaffarabad and its top commander Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi was reportedly arrested.

Aware of this possibility, the JuD organised a visit by members of domestic and foreign media to Muridke to prove that the place housed their educational and medical complex and didn't have any military training centre. Abdullah Muntazir and other JuD officials maintained that the sprawling, 300-acre complex imparted religious and modern education to students at two schools and ran a hospital for the community in Muridke and its surrounding areas. In fact, the JuD headquarters are located in Chauburji in Lahore city and its leader Hafiz Mohammad Saeed is mostly found there.
However, it is also a fact that the ban on the LeT and other militant organisations wasn't strictly enforced by the Pakistan government. Some of these outfits continued to maintain offices, hold meetings and publish magazines. Sometimes owing to lack of resolve, often due to strategic compulsions and on occasions on account of the strength of these jihadi organisations, successive governments have failed to disband such groups. President Asif Ali Zardari has referred to the militants defying and fighting the Pakistani state as non-state actors or stateless persons but it is not going to be easy for Islamabad to absolve itself of responsibility to rein in such elements by advancing this argument.

The BJP in India has used this line of argument by arguing that Pakistan cannot be depended upon to safeguard its nuclear weapons due to its inability to control the non-state actors. The same argument in a way has been used by the U.S. to carry out airstrikes in Pakistani territory without even informing Islamabad. The U.S. and its western allies, and in future India and even Afghanistan, would claim justification in launching strikes on Pakistan's soil due to the admission of President Zardari that the stateless elements based in Pakistan could be involved in terrorist attacks in other countries.

One could find fault in the manner in which the pillars of the PPP-led coalition government reacted to the Mumbai attacks. Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani's promise to send the ISI chief Lt-Gen Ahmad Shuja Pasha to India on a telephonic request by his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh without proper consultation was a mistake and it is now being cited in New Delhi and other world capitals as a proof of the weakness of the democratically elected civilian government vis-à-vis the Pakistani armed forces. Many would argue that this was indeed the case given the country's past record when military generals called the shots and arm-twisted politicians to do their bidding. But a public display of acknowledging this reality could have been avoided had the prime minister, or the president, acted wisely.

Zardari has pledged not to hand over the 20 or so men wanted by India and instead try them in Pakistan provided sufficient evidence against them was made available by New Delhi. Would he be able to abide by this pledge in view of the mounting pressure not only by India but also the U.S. and other countries? He could be pressured to at least deliver the two Indian nationals, Dawood Ibrahim and Tiger Memon, to India if indeed they are hiding in Pakistan. The two are wanted for their alleged involvement in the devastating 1993 bombings in Mumbai. At the same time, Zardari would be asked to put on trial the wanted Pakistanis in Pakistan.

The U.S. had invaded Afghanistan primarily because the Mulla Omar-led Taliban regime had refused to deliver Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden to face trial for his involvement in the 9/11 attack. Mulla Omar too had promised that he would try bin Laden in Afghanistan in case evidence against him was provided by the U.S. India is not America and Pakistan cannot be equated to Taliban's Afghanistan but those seeking to put the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks in the dock could use other methods to force Islamabad to comply.

The international community would certainly support India if it comes up with irrefutable proof that LeT was behind the Mumbai killings. Not only Indians but innocent citizens of several other countries were killed in a most brutal and unprecedented manner. It will not be easy to convince the world that Pakistan, due to political compulsions or other reasons, is unable to provide justice to the families of those killed and wounded in Mumbai terrorist attacks — described by many as India's 9/11.

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