Were outfits behind the serial blasts in Bangalore and Ahmedabad on Friday and Saturday totally unconnected to each other?
NEW DELHIl: Were outfits behind the serial blasts in Bangalore and Ahmedabad on Friday and Saturday totally unconnected to each other? Intelligence agencies have begun to seriously explore this angle as significant differences emerge in the way the two terror strikes were planned and executed.
Security agencies say the Bangalore blasts were meant to frighten and were not aimed at high casualties. The Ahmedabad blasts, however, were among the most sophisticated, deadly terrorist operations in recent times. They also bear a close resemblance to the Jaipur and Hyderabad blasts of May 13, 2008, and August 25, 2007, with significantly more sophistication, official sources said.
The Ahmedabad blasts “were revenge, to kill people,” says a senior intelligence official, and they “were meticulously planned.” Investigators believe the two explosives-laden cars found in Surat had been used to carry out the strikes in Ahmedabad and then abandoned by the terrorists. At least one of the cars had crossed a highway toll collection centre along the Mumbai-Ahmedabad route at least twice, meaning the terrorists had carried out a detailed recce before the attack.
From the appearance of the bombs and the chemicals used, besides the way they were planted, investigators believe the terror strikes in Jaipur and Ahmedabad were part of a larger jehad operation, while the Bangalore blasts were the handiwork of local SIMI activists.
Sources are, however, not ruling out the possibility of local SIMI activists in Ahmedabad and Jaipur providing logistical support to the larger group.
“There is a strong local component to the Ahmedabad blasts, the targets were carefully selected,” an official said.
“The common factor is a strong network of local people disgruntled with the government and system involved in both the Ahmedabad and Bangalore terror attacks. But there is nothing similar in the bombs or in the way they were planted,” says the official. “It is possible the same local organisation was involved in both the operations. In Bangalore they may have carried out the entire operation, while in Ahmedabad they provided the local logistics,” the official added.
If the Ahmedabad and Bangalore blasts were carried out by unconnected groups, the investigators will have even more to worry about. For, they will have to crack a network of terrorists operating in the Rajasthan-Gujarat-Maharashtra belt and another operating in Karnataka.
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