A. REACTIONS BY CITIZENS GROUPS

(i)

20 Feb 2007

PAKISTAN-INDIAN PEOPLES’ FORUM FOR PEACE AND
DEMOCRACY CONDEMNS THE FIRE BOMBING OF SAMJHAUTA
EXPRESS

Pakistan-India Peoples’ Forum for Peace and
Democracy (PIPFPD)strongly condemns the vicious
terrorist bombing of the Delhi-Lahore Samjhauta
Express in which 67 people were killed and more
than 50 injured. Indians and Pakistanis are
united in their deep grief at this heinous crime
that cannot be justified by any cause and we
express our deep condolences to the families of
the innocent victims of this act of terror.

The train symbolizes the deep desire of the
peoples of India and Pakistan to have good
neighbourly relations and it has served as a
crucial lifeline to maintain people to people
contacts across the border. The terror attack on
the train and its timings indicates that its
purpose was to derail the peace process and to
undermine people to people contacts, which has
been a significant component of the process of
building peace between the two countries. PIPFPD
urges that this tragic incident should not be
allowed to disrupt the process of normalizing
relations as had happened last July. In this
context, PIPFPD is deeply appreciative of the
efforts of the governments of India and Pakistan
to continue with the peace process, and welcomes
the move to continue without interruption the
train service and other cross border links. Let
this become an opportunity to affirm the urgency
of normalising relations in recognition of the
people of India and Pakistan’s commitment to
peace and friendship.

Tapan Kumar Bose

General Secretary

---

Press Release

February 19, 2007

TERROR ATTACK ON SAMJHAUTA EXPRESS

As citizens of India committed strongly committed
to peaceful and fruitful relations between India
and Pakistan as also unequivocally to lasting
justice and peace between all communities within
India, our heart goes out to all the victims of
the recent terror attack on board the Samjhauta
Express. The attack reveals above all, that
terror and terrorism has no religion and victims
of all communities, Muslim and Hindu, rich and
poor can easily become the victims of such an
attack. We offer our deepest condolences to all
the affected families in this moment of grief.

We unequivocally condemn this attack that is an
attempt not only to de-rail peace talks but also
to create schisms and rifts between communities.
We thank the political leadership of both
countries for using sombre and sensitive language
at such a time and urge them — specifically the
intelligence and investigative authorities of
India — to go further and rigorously investigate
and get to the bottom of such an attack.

Outfits of terror have no religion and should
never be equated as such. The language and acts
of terror can be perpetrated by fanatic outfits
within any and all social, political and
religious sections. Similarly victims of terror
as today’s brutal incident shows, can hail and do
hail from all sections. Terror and terrorism can
be home grown as well as imported; both equally
are not just anti-national, they strike at the
fabric of our nation because they create schisms
between communities.

Vijay Tendulkar, President CJP

Dr Prabhat Patnaik, noted economist

Teesta Setalvad, Secretary, CJP and co-editor Communalism Combat

Arvind Krishnaswamy, Treasurer, CJP,

Javed Akhtar, CJP and Muslims for Secular Democracy (MSD),

CP Chandraskehar, economist, JNU,

Javed Anand, CJP and MSD,

Nandan Maluste, CJP,

Anil Dharker, CJP,

Rajendra Prasad, SAHMAT

Ram Rehman, SAHMAT,

MK Raina, SAHMAT,

Hasan Kamal, MSD,

Rahul Bose, CJP

---

 B. SELECTED COMMENTARY AND EDITORIALS IN THE INDIAN AND PAKISTANI PRESS:

(i)

The Hindu

Feb 20, 2007

KEEP THE PEACE PROCESS ON TRACK

by Siddharth Varadarajan

For the third time in less than a year,
terrorists have attempted to derail the peace
process between India and Pakistan. Handing them
a victory is the last thing we should do.

IN TERMS of the choice of both target and timing,
it is not difficult to surmise that Sunday
night’s bomb blast on board the link train of the
Samjhauta Express was aimed primarily at stopping
the peace process between India and Pakistan.

As the indigent, divided families who travel on
it every week know so well, the time the train
takes to run from Delhi to Lahore can hardly be
justified by the laws of locomotion or the
dictates of cartography. And yet, that journey is
a symbol of the civilised neighbourliness
ordinary Indians and Pakistanis so desperately
yearn for, a hint of what the future might bring
if only the understanding and compromise its name
connotes were allowed to run to its final
destination.

The terrorists who bombed the train are clearly
not interested in that final destination. By
murdering at least 67 passengers on the eve of a
visit to India by Khurshid Ahmed Kasuri, the
Foreign Minister of Pakistan, their intention is
to provoke another bout of tension and
finger-pointing between Islamabad and New Delhi.
At the very least, their aim is to make the
process of travel between the two countries so
fraught with danger that few will want to take on
the risk and inconvenience of the journey by
train, bus or even plane.

In the wake of the coordinated bombing of several
commuter trains in Mumbai on July 7, 2006, the
terrorists were temporarily able to seize the
initiative but that mistake must not be repeated
again. Then, India postponed a scheduled meeting
of Foreign Secretaries and within days the
atmospherics began to degenerate. Policemen in
Mumbai and Delhi spoke loosely about the "pretty
good evidence" they had of the Pakistani
establishment’s involvement and it seemed as if
the peace process was going into free-fall. In
the end, however, the evidence turned out to be
less than clinching. The realisation also dawned
that dialogue and people-to-people contact help
rather than hurt the country’s interests.

After some deft pre-negotiation involving the
creation of a joint anti-terror mechanism, India
finally felt comfortable talking to Pakistan
again.

Though India was right to criticise Pakistan for
the latter’s failure to act against terrorist
organisations and training facilities on its
territory, it erred in linking the future of the
peace process to an incident for which
Islamabad’s complicity could only be inferred but
not established. Indeed, nearly seven months
after the blasts, evidence of Pakistan’s official
complicity continues to elude Indian
investigators. Unfortunately, this failure to
follow through with the specific allegation will
no doubt be used by Pakistan to question the
validity of India’s general case that terrorist
groups continue to operate from its territory.

Fundamental question

At the heart of the Indian policy dilemma lies a
fundamental question: is the government of Pervez
Musharraf involved in the instigation, planning
or execution of terrorist acts such as the blasts
in Mumbai and Malegaon and on the Samjhauta
Express? There is no doubt the Pakistani
establishment has the capability to mount these
kinds of covert operations but it is not clear
what its motive would be, or what it would stand
to gain from a termination of the peace process
because there can no longer be any doubt over
what the underlying logic of these blasts is.

But if the answer to the question of General
Musharraf’s involvement is No', then does this mean there are terrorist groups on the soil of Pakistan that are able to operate independently of, and in opposition to, the Pakistani state? It is obvious that this is so. The numerous bombings that have taken place inside Pakistan such as in Karachi last year on the birthday of Prophet Muhammad, the suicide attacks on Pakistani soldiers, and the attempts that have been made on General Musharraf's own life all suggest such "independent" terrorist groups not only exist but are flourishing. What is not clear, however, is the extent of connectivity between Pakistan's "independent" and "dependent" terrorist outfits such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad. Islamabad and Washington may like to pretend a Chinese Wall separates the two; in reality, there is mixing and osmosis of men and materiel. That is why the Pakistani establishment is at once both a sponsor and a victim of terrorism. Three years after promising to act, the Pakistani government remains indifferent to the existence of terrorist groups on its territory. Prominent individuals such as Masood Azhar go in and out of house arrest but the activities of their organisations continue more or less unchecked. At the same time, the overall scale of cross-border violence and infiltration in Jammu and Kashmir has fallen, though the scale and audacity of terrorist strikes elsewhere in India has gone up. In assessing its general policy to Pakistan, India knows there is no viable military option or compellance strategy to deal with this problem. The massive military mobilisation during Operation Parakram proved conclusively that India has no option other than diplomacy in dealing with Pakistan. This does not mean ending terrorism should not be the top-most priority for India. The Government should continue to insist that Pakistan fulfil its January 2004 commitment of not allowing its territory to be used for terrorism directed against India. Shutting down existing and new groups as and when they come up and arresting their leaderships is a verifiable demand that India should make. And for evidence of compliance, it need rely merely on the ample reports that the Pakistani press itself publishes from time to time, rather than on "narco-analysis" and "brain mapping" of terrorist suspects on this side. Before using the continuation of the peace process as a lever to try and stop terror again, however, India needs to ask whether the peace process has in any way compromised its national security. Today, many more visas are being issued to Pakistanis than in 2004. Trade is up, both direct and indirect. New transportation routes have opened up in Kashmir, Punjab and Rajasthan. Business delegations visit each other far more frequently. If any of this has led to national security being compromised on the margins - for example, some 30-odd Pakistanis who applied for visas to watch cricket two years ago have yet to return home - surely our agencies can devise a better system of address verification, information-sharing, and so on so as to minimise the risks involved in encouraging closer people-to-people contact and travel. In the long run, greater travel, tourism, and trade will enlarge the constituency of people inside Pakistan who support the normalisation of relations with India. This, in turn, could eventually alter the political dynamics within Pakistan. It is also largely thanks to the ongoing peace process that India and Pakistan have established a common vocabulary on Kashmir, something that would have been unthinkable a few years ago. Today, both sides agree that the solution lies in transcending the Line of Control dividing Jammu and Kashmir. This shift in thinking can hardly have endeared General Musharraf to the extremists who regard Kashmir's territory as their own sacred battleground. It is precisely the prospect of a peaceful solution that has got the authors of the Samjhauta Express and Mumbai train blasts so worked up. Rather than allowing terrorists to dictate the pace and content of the peace process, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Musharraf must insist on keeping the initiative in their own hands. There can be no turning back now. The Samjhauta Express martyrs must not have died in vain. ---- {{Date: Wed, 21 Feb 2007 10:14:27 +0500 MY LETTER PUBLISHED IN "THE HINDU"}} http://www.hindu.com/2007/02/21/stories/2007022102901001.htm I was appalled on reading the article by Praveen Swami and Siddharth Varadarajan's "Keep the peace process on track." For a Pakistani-American and a strong supporter of better India-Pakistan relations like me, the deep-seated prejudice of the writers was disheartening. Without a shred of evidence, they have laid the blame at the door of Pakistanis for the death of Pakistani citizens. Not once do they even suggest that this could be the work of Hindu extremists. F. Zakaria, Palo Alto, California {This was my original that they edited:} {I was appalled and disgusted by both Praveen Swami and Siddharth Varadarajan's op-ed pieces in The Hindu. As a Pakistani-American and a strong supporter of better India-Pakistan relations, the deep seated prejudice of the writers was deeply disheartening. Without a shred of evidence they lay all blame on Pakistanis for the death of Pakistani citizens on the Samjhota Express. Not once do they even raise the possibility that this could also be the work of Hindu extremists, so close to the 5th year anniversary of the terrible Godhra tragedy. If one cannot get fair-minded and balanced opinions in India's premier newspaper what hope do we have of healing the deep wounds of conflict between the two countries.} ------------------- (ii) {{The Telegraph <BR>February 20, 2007 EDITORIAL}} For a relationship that so routinely uses buses and trains as vehicles of expression, the message sent out by bombed train compartments is expected to be poignant. The gutted Samjhauta Express is supposed to derail the India-Pakistan peace process. The threat the attack conveys is no different from that which was borne out by the carnage that immediately preceded the first journey of the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus two years ago. Any step to normalize relations between the two countries is seen by hardliners as an attempt by the establishment to soft-pedal the Kashmir issue. Bus or train diplomacy thus takes the first beating each time the nations are close to ending the hiatus in bilateral ties. Like the much-hyped bus service, the Samjhauta Express in 2004 signalled a rapprochement between the feuding neighbours. That the train managed to escape the wrath of militants so far, and even to expand its network, was perhaps owing to its utility to thousands of passengers who found it a convenient way to mend broken ties and carry out business. Unfortunately, such mundane affairs have never been the concern of troublemakers. An ominous message had to be sent out before the visit of the Pakistan foreign minister, Mr Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri, could take the dialogue to its next logical step. A success like the Samjhauta Express was an obvious target. There is no reason to suspect that the bomb attack will permanently impair Indo-Pakistan relations, nor suspend train operations between the countries forever. Despite the initial hitches, the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus has taken off. The bomb attack on the train, too, is unlikely to keep determined travellers away for long. However, it is the commitment of the two governments to carrying on the peace process that will decide the severity of the immediate repercussions of the bombing. This is the first incident in which the majority of victims are of Pakistani origin. The fact that the bombs could have been planted in an unguarded railway station in India itself has also caused much consternation in the Pakistani establishment. It has accused the Indian administration of a security lapse with the same vehemence with which India often blames its neighbour in similar situations. Yet both the countries should be ashamed at this evident failure of their joint mechanism to combat terrorism. ---------------- (iii) {{The Hindu <BR>Feb 20, 2007 Editorial PEACE AND THE BURNING TRAIN}} The heart-rending scenes of charred bodies and twisted metal in two coaches of the Pakistan-bound Samjhauta Express are gory testimony to yet another major terrorist strike in India. The horrifying twin bomb explosions when the train was near Panipat in Haryana, killing at least 67 people, unite Pakistan and India in deep grief. They are a chilling reminder that terrorism in this day and age has international linkages in more ways than one. The identity of those responsible for the carnage is not yet known but the object and timing of the attack provide strong clues to the motives. Started in 1976 following the Shimla accord, the Samjhauta (Understanding’) Express has
symbolised good neighbourliness between India and
Pakistan. The train, which has run almost
uninterruptedly for more than three decades -
suspended only for short periods in the wake of
Operation Bluestar, the Babri Masjid demolition,
and the terrorist attack on Parliament - has been
a lifeline for people-to-people contact between
the two countries. Millions of people on either
side of the border, most of them poor folk, have
used the train to visit relatives and places of
pilgrimage.

The attack on the train (technically a special
train from which the passengers are transferred
at Attari to the India-Pakistan service) has
taken place a day before Pakistan’s Foreign
Minister Khursheed Kasuri arrives in New Delhi
for talks on the ongoing peace process. In a bid
to signal their strength, terrorists sometimes
choose to time their attacks to coincide with the
visit of dignitaries. In 2002, Hurriyat leader
Abdul Ghani Lone was shot dead in Srinagar a day
ahead of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s
visit to Kashmir. Two years earlier, 35 Sikhs
were massacred in Chattisinghpora in Kashmir on
the eve of President Bill Clinton’s visit to
India. It is more than likely that those who
perceive the India-Pakistan peace process as a
threat to their survival have perpetrated the
Samjhauta Express carnage. The attack may revive
memories of the Mumbai train blasts last year,
but there is an important difference. The
Samjhauta Express is a highly protected train and
the attack on it raises serious questions about
gaps in railway security. How did the incendiary
material used to set the coaches ablaze get past
the security checks at Old Delhi railway station?
The decision to allow the unaffected coaches to
resume their journey to Attari on the Indian side
of the border must be commended. Terrorists aim
at disrupting normal life. The best way to honour
the victims of terrorism is to ensure that life
goes on in the midst of heart-rending grief. And
the best way to defeat terrorist designs is to
ensure that the peace process remains on track.

---

(iv)

The News International

February 20, 2007

Editorial

SAMJHOTA EXPLOSION

The loss of as many as 65 precious lives on the
Samjhota Express linking Pakistan and India is
tragic and must be the work of the elements
opposed to the ongoing peace process between the
two countries. It is worth noting that the deadly
explosion took place a day before Pakistani
Foreign Minister Khursheed Kasuri’s three-day
trip to India, where according to various
reports, there may well be a breakthrough
agreement signed on liberalising the stringent
visa regime currently existing between the two
countries. The Samjhota Express was on its way to
Attari and eventually Lahore from Delhi when,
according to eyewitnesses, it was rocked by two
explosions as it was traveling through Panipat
district in the Indian state of Haryana. At least
65 people are reported to have been killed and
the Indian authorities believe that some of these
may well be Pakistani nationals returning to
Pakistan after visiting relatives in India. In
fact, a spokesperson of the Pakistan Foreign
Office said on Monday morning that "preliminary
investigations" showed that most of the victims
were Pakistani.

According to India’s railways minister, Laloo
Prasad Yadav, the blasts were caused by crude
explosives and struck two coaches of the train.
Pakistan has rightly condemned the blasts and has
asked India to conduct a thorough investigation
into the act of terrorism. One would have to
unequivocally agree with Mr Yadav’s remarks to
the press that the blasts were "aimed at
derailing peace talks" between the two countries.
One hopes that both sides will swiftly and
publicly express their determination to carry on
with the peace process. Also, both countries- and
India particularly- should understand that
dilly-dallying or perceived lack of progress only
serves to strengthen the hawks and opponents of
peace on both sides. As far as motive is
concerned, the attackers could be from an array
of opponents to the peace process; from the
militants in Indian-administered Jammu and
Kashmir who have opposed the ongoing dialogue and
taken a hard line on the four-point plan put
forward by President Pervez Musharraf to the Shiv
Sena/VHP/Bajrang Dal combine which has time and
again expressed opposition to the peace talks.
(Incidentally, the bombing comes almost a week
before the fifth anniversary of the infamous
Godhra train incident that ignited the Gujarat
communal riots of 2002.)

The latter in fact has an explicit agenda of
ridding India of its Muslims so that their ideal
of a true (read pure) Hindu nation can be
realised — and they make no effort really to
even hide it. In that context, attacking a train
carrying Pakistani passengers, and which is a
symbolic link between the two countries, serves
many purposes and drives home a message to the
Indian government that there are some people who
oppose the peace talks. Of course, these aren’t
the only opponents to peace between the two
countries. Several statements made in recent
months by the top Indian military brass —
particularly with regard to the settling of the
Siachen dispute — have shown that institution to
be bitterly opposed to peace — at least for now.
One hopes that in this case there will at least
be no finger-pointing by the Indian authorities
without a thorough investigation into the causes
of the blasts.

---

(v)

Economic Times

February 20, 2007

Editorial

PUT THE JOINT MECHANISM TO WORK

Blast on Samjhauta

The bombing of the Samjhauta Express, which has
claimed 66 lives and grievously injured scores of
others, is, without doubt, a cold-blooded attempt
by purveyors of terror to blow the fragile
Indo-Pakistan peace process apart.

Given the train is a symbol of dialogue, it’s
particularly vulnerable. Special measures to
secure the train from the nefarious designs of
groups, whose political and ideological existence
is inversely linked to the increasing proximity
between India and Pakistan, were certainly needed.

It’s time the Indian security-intelligence
establishment insisted passengers taking the
train go through rigorous security and
immigration clearances at the Delhi station
itself. Trans-national trains the world over
follow such procedures. Most importantly,
however, it would do well not to give in to its
anti-Pakistan reflex and point accusatory fingers
at Islamabad.

The Indian state should ensure that a rigorous
probe is conducted. All possibilities, even those
that appear implausible, must be explored.
Dubious arrests, and forced confessions, which
usually follow terror attacks, do little to
enhance the credibility of the Indian state.

Seen as part of a continuum of recent terror
strikes in Pakistan, the Samjhauta explosion
indicates that Manmohan Singh was,after all,
right in asserting that Pakistan, too, is a
victim of terror.

The train explosion now provides New Delhi the
opportunity to put its instinctive distrust for
Islamabad aside and try and make the joint
anti-terror mechanism truly functional. New Delhi
should realise that Pervez Musharraf does not
have complete control over Pakistan-based
terrorist groups.

Large sections of Pakistani society, which view
secular modernity with suspicion, are in the
thrall of political Islam. Communal carnages in
India, like the 2002 post-Godhra pogrom, together
with the Indian state’s failure to deliver
substantive justice to victims of communal riots,
have only legitimised the specious two-nation
theory that has been its ideological ballast.

New Delhi, even as it continues to engage
Islamabad vigorously, must deliver on its
constitutionally-ordained promise of secularism.
That is important if it is to be seen as a
trustworthy partner in peace by all of Pakistan.

---

HELPLINE NUMBERS FOR SAMJHAUTA EXPRESS

Northern Railway has started the following help line numbers:-

New Delhi Railway Station 1072, 011-23342954, 23341074

Head Quarter 011-23389319, 23389853, 23385106

Hazrat Nizamuddin Station 011-24355954

Ambala Station 1072, 0171-2610329, 2611072

Amritsar Station 0183-2564485, 2223171

Ludhiana 0161-2760006

Jalandhar 0181-2223504

At site 0180-3297823, 6450342

---

Indian Express

February 22, 2007

’A NEW TRACK IS OPENED UP EACH TIME A PERSON FROM
ONE COUNTRY CROSSES THE BORDER TO THE OTHER’

by Furrukh Khan

For many passengers on the Samjhauta Express on
its way to Lahore from Delhi, two explosions in
the middle of the night ended everything.
’Samjhauta’ offers a variety of meanings:
understanding, agreement, coming together,
compromise and other such affable connotations.
This might have been the idea behind naming this
train service which provides multiple avenues of
negotiation and contact for people between two
traditionally hostile and often suspicious
governments.

Today, that aim of integration, much like the
train which symbolised it, lies in a wreckage.
One can only imagine how the victims’ families
are dealing with this mortal blow. Right now the
attention should be solely focused on the victims
and survivors of this terrible tragedy.

Historically, Panipat has been the site where
many innocents have lost their lives to the
forces of bigotry. It befalls the rest of us to
fight back on multiple fronts and talk about
coexistence, about tolerance and about life. Such
should be a path undertaken by a wider, more
diverse group of people from Pakistan and India
as a practical and viable alternative to the
’official’ track of diplomacy. History has
revealed that official talks continue to be held
hostage to the actions of a few. But parallel
tracks exist. Unfortunately, only one,
euphemistically named ’track two’ is talked
about. But a new track is opened up each time a
person from one country crosses the border to the
other. It is only by this physical act that one
is able to challenge the ideologies of fear and
loathing instilled in sections of the population.

The victims of the Samjhauta Express carnage,
which included children, women and men, all of
them innocent, paid a terrible price. It could
have been any one of us who might have been
unfortunate enough to have been on that train
that day. Under ’normal’ circumstances, people
could have travelled easily across the border to
the site of this terrible tragedy. However,
considering the track record of India and
Pakistan with their citizens, there is no doubt
that those affected would have to deal with more
insults that add to their injuries.

Now is the time to grieve for those whose lives
have been forever changed. Yet, when the time
comes to take up the task of pushing for a more
encompassing dialogue between the people and the
governments of Pakistan and India, there has to
be a more steely resolve to open more tracks of
communication. While one might not be able to do
much for the victims, one can at least promise to
use their memory to fuel the drive for better
relations between the two countries. The moral
majority has to make its presence felt through
its participation in a variety of ventures which
would make it much more difficult for the
minority to believe that it can destroy the
feelings of goodwill which beat in so many hearts
on both sides of the border. Next time someone
sets out from Delhi for Lahore, it should be the
warmth of a Lahori that greets the traveller, not
the murderous smoke and fire of a terrible attack.

The writer teaches postcolonial studies at Lahore
University of Management Sciences, Lahore

---

Dawn

21 February 2007

Editorial

SAMJHOTA EXPRESS TRAGEDY

MONDAY’S tragedy at Panipat is too staggering for
words. The identification of the charred bodies
will take some time. But so far a minimum of 68
people have fallen victim to flames lit by men
utterly indifferent to human suffering. The
fire-bombing of the Samjhota Express, carrying
757 passengers, 553 of whom were Pakistanis, did
more than cause death and destruction in Samjhota
Express; it rocked the subcontinent itself.
Newspaper reports and TV images cannot catch even
a fraction of the humanitarian dimensions of the
tragedy, the grief and misery inflicted on the
hundreds of families, and the agonies of the
severely burnt now fighting for their lives. What
precisely the perpetrators of this crime wanted
to achieve by killing innocent civilians and
destroying entire families is a mystery. If the
aim was to sow discord and derail the peace
process, both governments have made it clear that
such dastardly deeds will not be allowed to stand
in the way of the normalisation process and the
pursuit of the composite dialogue to which they
are committed. In fact, as Pakistan has made it
clear, even the train service will continue to
run on schedule. Condemning "such wanton acts of
terrorism", President Pervez Musharraf said that
he would not allow "elements who want to sabotage
the on-going peace process to succeed in their
nefarious designs". Indian Prime Minister Dr
Manmohan Singh’s focus was on the humanitarian
side of the tragedy, and he reaffirmed his
government’s "commitment Š to ensure that its
perpetrators are punished". Monday’s crime at
Panipat came a week ahead of the fifth
anniversary of the burning of the train at Godhra
and a day before the arrival of Foreign Minister
Khurshid Kasuri in New Delhi for talks with his
Indian counterpart. It took years of
investigations and court judgments to finally
establish that the Muslims initially held
responsible for the Godhra train fire were not to
blame. In the present case, too, one hopes that
time will sooner or later establish the truth and
unmask the fiends behind this despicable crime
whose victims were innocent people. It must also
be noted that the casualties would have been far
fewer if the Indian authorities had not sealed
off all train windows.

There are several ways in which the impact and
immediate outcome of the Panipat tragedy are
different from similar acts of terrorism
committed earlier. Unlike what happened
immediately after the Bombay train blasts in July
last year, no responsible person in the Indian
government has pointed fingers at "Pakistan-based
terrorist groups" for the crime. Since a majority
of the dead are Pakistanis, no one in his right
mind would see Islamabad’s hand in the crime.
Secondly, we now have in place an Indo-Pakistan
“anti-terrorism mechanism” to which President
Musharraf and Prime Minister Singh agreed at
Havana last year. This part of the Havana
statement was criticised in India by some
right-wing elements who objected to the
establishment of a forum designed "to identify
and implement counter-terrorism initiatives and
investigations." The existence of such an
instrument obviously irks those in India who
blame Pakistan for every act of terrorism even
before investigations begin.

There is no doubt that the two sides will jointly
investigate a crime that has shocked the world.
There are extremists and hate groups on both
sides of the border, and they would love to
derail the peace process. However, the two
governments must know that the scourge of
terrorism now seems to be operating on a scale
that, if left unchecked, could make a mockery of
not only the peace process but everything else
meant to promote harmony and understanding
between Pakistan and India.