India has relaxed its tourist visa rules by lifting restrictions imposed on foreign visitors who want to visit India within a period of 60 days of their earlier visit.Citizens of Pakistan, China, Iran, Iraq, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Sudan, people of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin and "stateless persons" will continue to come under the 60-day rule.
In an interview to Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa, Stephen Tankel, who is currently in India to study home grown terror, talks about Headley, co-accused Tawwahur Rana and LeT founder Hafiz Saeed.
Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik on Sunday blamed Indian security agencies for their failure to prevent the Mumbai terror attack and alleged that Indian non-state actors were involved in the massacre.
The horror in numbers: November 26, 2008. 66 hours. 10 terrorists. 166 innocent people dead.
Hafiz Saeed, chief of terror outfit Lashkar-e-Tayiba and prime accused in the 26/11 Mumbai terror strike, has openly challenged India to prove that he is a terrorist.
'Lashkar is full of soldiers; it is full of spies, and you never know who is retired and who isn't... Headley asked one of the army majors, who claimed to be a retired officer, from where a lot of the information was coming from and he was told the military have become particularly proud of a series of sources they have in India.' Adrian Levy, co-author of The Siege: The Attack on the Taj, tells Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt in an exclusive interview.
A team of National Investigation Agency is likely to visit the United States soon to question 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawur Hussain Rana for helping Lashkar-e-Tayiba operative David Headley to disguise as immigrant consultant during his visits to India.
The worst-ever attack on a police force by Maoists, the blast in Pune at the beginning and the Varanasi explosion at the end of the year blotted the copybook of the security forces, which otherwise kept 2010 free from terror.
International arrest warrants have been issued by the Interpol against five Pakistani nationals for their alleged role in the Mumbai terror attack and plotting to carry out more strikes.
Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa speaks to Radha Vinod Raju, the NIA's first head, about the David Headley revelations in a Canada court
'If India had used its diplomatic leverage after 26/11, we had lots in our favour but we abandoned it. The world thinks we are not serious about handling terror,' says security analyst Maroof Raza.
US Ambassador to India, Timothy Roemer, was in Mumbai this week to pay tribute to 26/11 victims and to lay out a path for future US-India relations.
External Affairs Minister S M Krishna has disapproved of Home Secretary G K Pillai's remarks on the Inter State Intelligence's role in Mumbai terror attacks on the eve of Indo-Pak talks.
The US said that the Lashkar-e-Tayiba, which so far had focused primarily on India, is having global aspirations and has spread its tentacles beyond Pakistan and Afghanistan, as manifested by the David Headley case. "Generally, LeT was east focused on India. They're now in the west. Actually, they're not just in the west, focused on Pakistan. There are LeT elements focused on Afghanistan," Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has said.
Observing that the revised regulations primarily affect travellers who wish to enter India within two months of their last departure from India on tourist visa, the US Embassy said it has received reports about the problem being faced by other visa holders also.
'Amid the different versions of truth on the Ishrat case, what is certain is that Ishrat's mother Shamima Kausar, who has continued to maintain that Headley's confession was nothing but an attempt by powerful people to save themselves in the case, is unlikely to find a closure anytime soon.'
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday pressed US President Barack Obama to convince Pakistan to take strong action against terrorists involved in anti-India activities in that country following disclosures made by LeT operative David Headley.
The move will come in view of the busting of the Lashker-e-Tayiba plot, in which the Pakistan-based terror group was planning to use Pakistan-born US national David Coleman Headley and Canadian passport holder Tahawwur Hussain Rana to launch terror attacks in India.
The major thrust of the meeting is on anti-India terrorism that continues to emanate from Pakistan.
In related findings for India, the FATF in a report brought out last month, chronicled the use of banking channels to fund the activities of the banned terror group Hizb-ul-Mujahideen.
India has provided Pakistan further details about involvement of Jamaat-ud-Dawaa chief Hafiz Saeed in Mumbai terror attacks on the basis of disclosures made by Pakistani-American Lashker operative David Headley and made it clear that action against him and other handlers would be a major confidence building measure.
In the bowlers list, Bumrah achieved a career-high ranking of 28 while fellow teammate Mohammad Shami moved two places to 24th.
US prosecutors have filed a memorandum, opposing the bail petition of terror suspect Tahawwur Hussain Rana, charged with plotting terror attacks in India and Denmark.
Terror suspect Tahawwur Hussain Rana, under investigation for possible links to 26/11, has categorically denied any involvement in the Mumbai attacks, his lawyer said on Monday and asserted that the Pakistani-Canadian "harbours no ill-will" against Indians.
Arrested terrorist Tahawwur Hussain Rana may have been the one who had arranged for the fake student identification cards carried by Ajmal Kasab and nine other terrorists, who were involved in the Mumbai attacks in 2008, said intelligence sources.
As Pakistan took exception to Home Secretary G K Pillai's recent remarks on Inter Services Intelligence's role in Mumbai attacks, India on Friday said that there is no acrimony between the two sides on the issue.
India and Pakistan are talking once again today at the official level. The preparation on the Indian side leaves no doubt that the focus will be on terrorism. The foreign ministry is consulting with the home ministry, defence ministry and security agencies. Pakistan will be placed in the dock. We can reasonably expect Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao to press for the complete unravelling of the 26/11 conspiracy.
Souces point out that Abdul Al-Hooti could have done more than just providing SIM cards which were used during the Mumbai attack. With evidence against Al-Hooti in the Mumbai attack increasing, the Indian agencies say that apart from interrogating Headley on these lines, they would also be building a case to seek Al-Hooti's extradition from Oman.
Many multiplexes and theatres in Gujarat refrained from screening Mahesh Bhatt's Tum Mile following a demand by the Mahagujarat Janta Party (MJP) for state-wide ban on it, while at other places party workers forced closure of the film shows.
Addressing media persons after visiting the blast site and the Sassoon Hospital, where the injured have been admitted, Chidambaram said: "Many soft targets need to be monitored. The best police officers have been put on the job and the Maharashtra Anti-Terror Squad have taken over case."
A 61-year-old American national, identified as Winston Marshal Carmichael, was detained at the Indira Gandhi International airport in New Delhi on late on Wednesday night minutes before he was to board a Qatar-bound flight after a knife was found in his hand baggage.
Five years after his arrest during the 26/11 strike on Mumbai and over a year after he was hanged to death after a much-publicised trial, Lashkar-e-Tayiba terrorist Ajmal Kasab continues to inspire myriad conspiracy theories.
The curious case of the Indian Consulate in Chicago issuing a visa to Pakistani-Canadian Tahawwur Rana, who was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for allegedly plotting terror attacks in India, appears to be getting more complicated. Both Rana and his wife Samraz Rana had been issued multi-entry visas by the Consulate with the visa stamp clearly stating that this had been issued at the 'discretion of the CG' (Consul General).
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's office has assured film-maker Mahesh Bhatt that the Home Ministry will inquire into the "leak" of information relating to his son having known David Headley, a US terror suspect arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for plotting strikes in India. An agitated Bhatt had written a letter to Singh on November 15 in which the film-maker said he felt a sense of "great betrayal" over the manner in which his son was handled by investigators.
'The Ishrat encounter was neither genuine, nor fake. I believe it was a 'controlled killing,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'With his passing comes the end of Indian cricket history.'
The arrest of alleged Babbar Khalsa International operative Balwinder Singh by the Federal Bureau of Investigation will help India understand the international operations of this outfit better.
He also said it was for India to decide on dates for Foreign Secretary-level talks, postponed in the wake of the terror strike.
'Prime Minister Manmohan Singh may be anxious for a farewell visit to Washington in October,' says retired Ambassador K C Singh, 'but bending backwards on America's PRISM policy is going to earn him scorn at home and contempt abroad.'
The peaks Prithvi Shaw scaled on the first day of his Test career in numbers, via Rajneesh Gupta.
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