The attack on an Indian police station in the state of Punjab, close to the Pakistan border, ended on Monday when at least 11 people — including all three heavily armed terrorists, five security personnel and three civilians — were killed. No one yet knows who the terrorists were, but by attacking an Indian target so close to the Pakistani border, they were clearly seeking to increase the simmering tension between India and Pakistan, which the two sides have done little to deal with.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had a brief meeting in Russia two weeks ago on the fringe of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit and they agreed to have a bilateral meeting in 2016 at the South Asian Asscoiation for Regional Cooperation summit.
What little momentum this lacklustre process enjoys, has already been derailed by protests on either side and the latest terrorist attack is clearly seeking to exploit this failure. The two leaders would be better off agreeing to a separate bilateral meeting with a serious agenda, whereby they can tackle the major bilateral issues and reject attempts from extremists to stall their talks.
Nonetheless, it is important to find out where the terrorists came from. There is a working assumption on the Indian side that they came from Pakistan, but that has to be proved before any action can be taken. It is remotely possible that the attack was an internal Indian affair perpetrated by followers of the Khalistan movement, who were Punjab separatists led by the late Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, although nothing has been heard from this movement for more than 20 years, when they were an active force and a genuine problem.
If the terrorists came from Pakistan, it is deeply worrying since India has heavily strengthened the 460km of India-Pakistan border in Punjab and ever since 1993, when the border fencing was completed by India, there has not been a single major incident of cross-border terrorism in Punjab.
If the terrorists managed to penetrate the border, India has important security questions to answer.
