Delhi blast: The pillars of the Indian state are crumbling

On the face of it, a court where ordinary people flock for redressal of mundane disputes may seem an unlikely target for terrorists. No cause is meaningfully advanced by blowing to bits people who are just going through the timeless grind of the legal system. Yet, if there’s one overarching message from yesterday’s blast at the Delhi High Court, which killed 11 people, it is that it expands the range of the pillars of the Indian state that have now been targeted by terrorists. Bomb blasts and terrorist strikes in Mumbai have typically targeted commercial interests – the stock exchange, the diamond bourse and the teeming markets, among others. That’s because Mumbai is in many ways the engine of India’s economy, and targeting the money trail gets the terrorists more bang for their vile efforts.

Wednesday's blast at the Delhi High Court is the latest instance of terrorists targeting the symbols of the Indian state. But since Delhi is all about temporal power, it is the pillars of the state that are being targeted. The strand that connects yesterday’s blast with the high-profile attack on the Red Fort in 2000 and the Parliament complex in 2001 is that all of them are powerful symbols of a democratic state. With all its historical associations, the Red Fort represents the majesty of Indian executive authority. And Parliament is (despite the ongoing debate over whether its members are worthy of the privilege they are accorded) today the potent symbol of a working Indian democracy. If the targets in the past were the executive and the legislature, yesterday’s attack was aimed at the judiciary, the third pillar of the Indian state. Tragically, however, the blood price in every case is paid by ordinary folks who are unrepresentative of the might of the state, and in fact are themselves victims in their own way. The connection with the 2001 attack on Parliament is doubly reinforced by the purported reason for yesterday’s attack. The terror group that has reportedly claimed responsibility for yesterday’s blast, the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI), is believed to have demanded the withdrawal of the death sentence on Afzal Guru, who has been convicted for the attack on Parliament. Faced with such an open and overwhelming challenge to its authority, the response of the Indian state – and, in fact, all the elements that go to make up the edifice of our parliamentary democracy – has been monumentally inept. For although the death sentence was handed down after due – and laborious – process of law, it has now become the subject of political back-and-forth. An effort is now on in the Jammu & Kashmir Assembly to pass a resolution to demand that the death sentence on Afzal Guru be commuted.

First, Parliament, one of the most powerful symbols of the Indian democracy, is targeted by vile terrorists; then the executive authority of the day is unable or unwilling to implement the verdict in the case handed down by the judiciary; to compound that, the entire political establishment plays political football with the judicial verdict. …It’s easy to see why terrorists have been emboldened into repeated attacks on the might of the Indian state: they know they can get away with it, given the ineffectual response of the executive and the natural inclinations of the political establishment across the spectrum to play one-upmanship games with the issue of terrorism.

HuJI or Indian Mujahideen?

Just a day after the Delhi bomb blast outside the High Court, investigating agency National Investigating Agency (NIA) has been confused as they received two emails from two prominent terror groups claiming the responsibility of the blast.


NIA started probing an email sent by Indian Mujahideen (IM) which on Thursday, Sep 8 claimed that they were responsible and masterminded the blast outside the court in the national capital.


The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) official also informed, "Mail can't be ignored, we will investigate it." Indian Mujahideen is being parented by the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT).


Earlier Harkat-ul- Jehadi (HuJI) had claimed the responsibility of the blast. It has also been reported that HuJI had sent an email to a media house citing that this blast in the High Court was in retaliation to the death sentence pronounced on Afzal Guru, who has been convicted in the Parliament Attack case. 

Bomb blast outside court 11 killed in New Delhi

A powerful bomb hidden in a briefcase ripped through a crowd of people waiting to enter a New Delhi courthouse Wednesday, killing 11 people and wounding scores more in the deadliest attack in India’s capital in nearly three years. An al-Qaida-linked group claimed responsibility, though government officials said it was too early to name a suspect.
The attack outside the High Court came despite a high alert across the city and renewed doubts about India’s ability to protect even its most important institutions despite overhauling security after the 2008 Mumbai siege. “Have we become so vulnerable that terrorist groups can almost strike at will?” opposition lawmaker Arun Jaitley asked in Parliament.
The bomb left a deep crater on the road and shook the courthouse, sending lawyers and judges fleeing outside. “There was smoke everywhere. People were running. People were shouting. There was blood everywhere. It was very, very scary,” said lawyer Sangeeta Sondhi, who was parking her car near the gate when the bomb exploded. The government rallied Indians to remain strong in the face of such attacks.
“We will never succumb to the pressure of terrorists,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said during a visit to neighboring Bangladesh. “This is a long war in which all political parties and all the people of India will have to stand united so that this scourge of terrorism is crushed.” The bomb exploded about 10:14 a.m. near a line of more than 100 people waiting at a reception counter for passes to enter the court building to have their cases heard.
The blast killed 11 people and wounded 76 others. Their identities were not available, but no judge were among the victims. People ran to assist the injured, piling them into three-wheeled taxis to take them to the hospital. Ambulances and forensic teams rushed to the scene, along with sniffer dogs and a bomb disposal unit, apparently checking for any further explosives.
Renu Sehgal, a 42-year-old housewife with a case before the court, had just received her pass and was standing nearby with her uncle and mother while her husband parked their car when she heard the explosion. “The sound was so huge and suddenly people started running,” she said. “We were all in such a big panic. I’m lucky I survived.” The court building was evacuated after the attack.
The blast probe was quickly turned over to the National Investigation Agency, established after the Mumbai siege to investigate and prevent terror attacks. Police were scouring the city for possible suspect, searching hotels, bus stands, railway stations and the airport, said top security official U.K. Bansal. All roads out of the city were under surveillance as well, he siad.
Late Wednesday, police also released two sketches they said were based on descriptions given by eyewitnesses who claimed they had seen someone with a briefcase waiting in line outside the building. “We are determined to attack down the perpetrators of this horrific crime and bring them to justice,” Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram told Parliament. An email sent to several TV news channels claimed the bombing on behalf of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami, an Islamic extremist group said to be based in Pakistan that was blamed for numerous terror strikes in India.
The U.S. State Department says the group has deep ties to al-Qaida, and some of its members have trained at the groups camps. The email demanded the immediate repeal of the death sentence handed to Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri man convicted to target other courts, including the Supreme Court. “We cannot say anything about the email until we have investigated it thoroughly,” NIA chief S.C. Sinha said. “At this point the investigation is fully open and it’s not possible to name any group.”
The court bombing was the first major terror attack in India since a trio of blasts in Mumbai killed 26 people on July 13. Suspicion for those attacks fell on the shadow extremist network known as the Indian Mujahedeen, though no one has been arrested. The bombers struck the court, an appeals panel below India’s Supreme Court, even though the capital had been on high alert because Parliament was in session. On May 25, a small explosion that appeared to be a failed car bomb erupted in the court’s parking lot.
After the 2008 Mumbai attacks, the government expanded police recruiting and training, set up the NIA and established commando bases across the country so rapid reaction forces could swiftly arrive at the scene on an attack. Jaitley, in Parliament, said the court bombing raised “deep concern” about “the kind of institutions and systems we have to build to fight this menace.” But official say the number of targets in a nation of 1.2 billion makes it impossible to provide full security.
Dharmendra Kumar, a senior police officer, told reporters the court building itself was strongly protected by police but the explosion hit a busy main road outside. K.P.S. Gill, a former senior police official, said Kumar’s comment showed the police had a “ridiculous mindset” and India needed to rethink its strategy on Preventing terror. “If the public collects there, then you must protect that area,” Gill said.
The attack rekindled memories of the string of deadly bombings that rocked the country in 2008, including a series of coordinated bomb blasts in New Delhi on Sept. 13 that killed 21 people. Many of those attacks were blamed on militant groups composed of disaffected Muslins furious at perceived injustices at the hands of India’s Hindu majority. But that violence mostly abated after the November 2008 siege of Mumbai, when 10 Pakistan-based militants wreaked havoc across India’s commercial capital for 60 hours, killing 166 people.
However, a series of smaller attacks raised concerns in recent months that the violence was returning. Last Sept. 19, two gunmen on a motorcycle shot and wounded two Taiwanese men outside a famous New Delhi mosque. A few minutes later, a bomb rigged to a nearby car malfunctioned and caught fire. On Dec 7, a bomb exploded in the city of Varanasi, killing a 2-year-old, and a few months later came the failed attack on the High Court in New Delhi. Wednesday a statement from the government of Pakistan expressed “deepest sympathies” for the families of those killed in the explosion and the government and people of India.