Gurdaspur Terrorists were Smarter Cookies Than 26/11 Attackers

The terrorists who struck in Gurdaspur had taken due care to remove all traces that could have identified them.

The three terrorists who attacked Dinanagar in Gurdaspur, Punjab, had not only come fully prepared but took extraordinary precautions to conceal their identity, leaving intelligence agencies groping in the dark.

Identity Crisis

The three terrorists had come fully prepared and took precautions to conceal their identity

They were clean shaven and carried no religious symbols

They wore olive green fatigues but had covered their faces with black cloth

They had cleared all body hair and had even cut out labels from their clothes, including undergarments

All three were circumcised and shouted pro-Pakistan slogans

The three were dressed in olive green (OG) fatigues usually donned by Army personnel and carried AK-47 assault rifles, Chinese-made grenades and 10 magazines. They were clean shaven, unlike the Lashkar-e-Toiba or Taliban militants who generally sport long beard, and did not carry any religious symbols.

The Punjab Roadways bus driver, Nanak Chand, who displayed presence of mind and saved the lives of at least 70 passengers by deciding not to stop when the militants tried to flag him down, got suspicious only by the fact that though they wore OG they had covered their faces with black cloth.

Identity Concealed

What investigators found, once the operation ended, was that the terrorists had taken all precautions to hide their identity. They carried no document, photograph or slogans to identify them. They had cleared all body hair and had even cut out labels from their clothes, including undergarments. The only giveaway, if one can call it so, was that all three were circumcised and were shouting pro-Pakistan slogans as they sprayed bullets in the police station.

A senior officer who coordinated the operation said that the gun battle lasted nearly 12 hours, the longest since the Mumbai terror attack, because the Punjab Police commandos wanted to take at least one of the terrorists alive so he could be interrogated and a link established with their handlers.

However, the terrorists appeared determined not to be caught alive by the security forces. It was also clear that they had come prepared to be ‘martyred’ because they carried only a small amount of dry fruit. The agencies have taken DNA samples from the bodies and efforts are being made to match these with the records available with forensic laboratories.

GPS Giveaway

The only clue with the Indian intelligence agencies now is the GPS system left behind by them which helped them reach the railway line near Dinanagar and the police station.

The GPS set has been sent for forensic analysis and according to initial reports, it was switched on at Gharota village, some 15 kilometres inside Pakistani territory. It then travelled north towards Bamiyal before reaching Dinanagar after crossing the Ravi.

Intelligence agencies are also talking to villagers living close to the border to find out about the movements of the terrorists.

Broadcast Fiasco

However, a section of electronic media went overboard and aired totally incorrect and explosive information without cross-checking the facts. A region channel interviewed a shocked resident who asserted that one of the terrorists was a Sikh. While there was speculation till Monday noon that the attack could be the handiwork of the ISI to rake up the Khalistan movement again in Punjab, and that the target was Punjab and not J&K, the airing of this interview carried the potential to escalate tension.

Fortunately, no national channel picked it up and, as later found, the claims made by the interviewee were incorrect. In fact, another “eyewitness” had claimed that there was also a woman terrorist in the group, thereby adding an entirely new dimension to terrorism. This also, of course, proved incorrect.

Some of the TV channels initially aired live pictures of the arrival of army personnel, some of them carrying shoulder-held rocket launchers, and once again tried to compromise the security men as done during the 26/11 Mumbai attack.

The Information and Broadcasting ministry had then issued a set of guidelines and the entire media had agreed to abide by the directions. Not only did some of the private TV channels show live visuals, even Doordarshan broadcast the action live for some time till the I&B ministry intervened. Subsequently, some of the channels made it a point to assert that they did not show live feed.

(The writer is a Chandigarh-based senior journalist)