O J's Corner Reflections

Cops’ shock and awe

The serial blasts in Mumbai which shook the megapolis by surprise have, in fact, been a shock and awe for the cops.

By any stretch of imagination can the complacency of the police be condoned.

In spite of umpteen units of a variety of intelligence agencies trawling the Mumbaiscape, particularly after a series of monstrous blasts from 1993, it remains a mystery how nothing, not even shreds of suspicion, could be gauged before-hand.

It was public knowledge that the buildings belonging to Dawood Ibrahim in Mumbai were slated for auction on Tuesday, by now known as 7/11 (July 11). The horrendous RDX explosions ripped open the heart of Mumbai precisely the same day.

No one can deny the fact that earlier on several auction occasions there were no takers for Dawood property, simply for fear of the global terror-operator carrying capability to decimate the would-be title-holder. No one can fault the reluctance on the part of the bidders to corner this slice of property belonging to the dreaded don. The police top-brass is feigning ignorance of this development? Tad difficult to decipher this mind-block.

Little solace is it that the shaken Mumbai Police Commissioner A N Roy confided to scribes that the explosions have taken the police force off guard. The Mumbai police had not received messages from the intelligence agencies about any looming threat. Any slum-dweller would have felt a hunch about unfolding property developments relating to the don.

Commissioner Roy is reported to have said: “We have a good intelligence machinery, but this time the terrorists took us by surprise. The police force had to pay a heavy price for one failure.

Previously, the police had unearthed a huge haul of 50 kilos of RDX. The police had raided various places in Mumbai, Nashik, Malegaon and Aurangabad.

The city police head knows it too well that nobody will appreciate the earlier work as people are shocked by the explosions.

Well, let us be aware of the magnitude of the difficulty in having clairvoyance of terrorist attacks in a city where multitudes of populace wriggle about like worms in a cesspool. There are skyrises for the wealthy, flats for the middle class and bungalows for the upper class, but the poorest of the poor have their habitations in dilapidated hutments and makeshift shelters. How could anyone differentiate a genuine denizen from the dubious death-bringers?

Is it possible for the authorities to give an assurance that there would be no more blasts in Mumbai, the hub of frenetic economic activities spurring people to make giant strides in the growth quotient one way or other, from the measly wage-earners to dealers of diamonds? Not at all. Assurances would be hollow. The need of the hour is to catch the culprits and show it to the world that we are as good as anyone in the West to smoke out the hideous terrorists from their burrows.

In New York, London, Madrid and similar cities, a second attack has so far been impossible for the terrorists. The law-enforcing agencies are waiting with bated breath to keeping a close watch on anyone moving around in suspicious circumstances. Let us not lag behind in caution.