Mumbai: The serial blasts in Mumbai were a failure of policy and not just intelligence, veteran Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani said here Thursday. He also alleged that Pakistan could be sustaining the Indian Mujahideen, being blamed by some for the triple bombings the day before.
‘It is a policy failure not intelligence failure. There have been repeated attacks on Mumbai, this is a failure of policy,’ Advani said at a press conference after visiting the injured in various hospitals. At least 17 people were killed and 131 injured in the blasts Wednesday evening.
‘I condemn the incident, but along with that appeal to the government that you should have an attitude of zero tolerance towards terrorism,’ he said.
Advani quoted reports of a probable link between the blast and the Indian Mujahideen (IM) and said even if it were behind the attack it was being sustained by Pakistan.
‘I don’t know if it is Indian Mujahideen, even if IM, they get sustenance from Pakistan. The last attack on our land is proved to have been engineered by the ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence),’ Advani said.
The BJP leader said the government of India should take strong actions to get Pakistan’s intelligence agency ISI declared a terrorist organisation and stop talks with the country until concrete steps against terror were taken.
‘So far as India is concerned, the government of India should shed its ambivalence to terrorism,’ Advani said, adding that India’s should have a zero tolerance policy towards terrorism.