Our July 2005 cover

Brothers Kafeel and Sabeel Ahmed, implicated in the Glasgow plot, ironically, come from what is internationally India’s best-known city, the country’s it capital—Bangalore. A member of their extended family, Mohammed Haneef is being investigated for his role in the plot to blow up a West End nightclub by detonating a parked Mercedes packed with firebombs. This is the first time that anyone born and bred in India has been implicated in an incident of international terrorism.

What is most baffling and worrisome for India is that neither the Ahmed brothers nor Haneef fit any conventional profile of an extremist. They do not come from the poor, ghettoised, alienated sections of society. The Ahmeds’ doctor parents had enough resources to put one son through medical college and have one complete an engineering degree. Their cousin Haneef followed an identical path. To the world they were quiet, studious young men. Yet within years of going overseas for further studies and employment, they became radicalised enough to be willing accomplices in a plan as horrific as this.

There is much that is unknown about the details of their radicalisation but going by the evidence of this case, there is a strong possibility that Al Qaeda cells are active in India. Our Parliament, commuter trains and crowded market places have already been attacked. This knowledge, that Al Qaeda has opened shop, will only reinforce a sense of vulnerability in India’s public spaces.

Our cover story looks at this new dimension of terror, one with a direct Indian connection. Our bureaus in Delhi and Bangalore dissect the trail of the plot hatched and profile the doctors of death. Security expert Jason Burke, who has written a book on the Al Qaeda, explains the phenomenon of ‘Londonistan’ or how one of the world’s most cosmopolitan cities became a training centre for terrorists. In London, Aditi Khanna speaks to South Asian professionals in the UK and how the incident has changed their lives.

Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington exactly a year ago, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had said, “We have 150 million citizens who practise the faith of Islam. And I say it with some pride... that not one of them has joined the ranks of these gangs like the Al Qaeda or other terrorist outfits”. Sadly, Mr Prime Minister, that is no longer true and we should all be very worried.

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