Gurdaspur terror attack: Another terror module on loose

New Delhi/Chandigarh: Even as preliminary probe into the terror strike in Gurdaspur district indicates that the three suspected Lashker-e-Toiba militants had entered the country from Pakistan, what is also raising hackles in the security establishment is the uncertainity over whether there exists a “second terror group” that is still at large and may try to strike in some locations before August 15.

“The fact that the terrorists fed the GPS coordinates on July 21 — five days prior to the attack — and these were the actual target spots, shows that the entire operation was planned well in advance on Pakistani soil,” a top security official said.

Talwandi point, Parmanand village and Gurudaspur Civil Lines and Army unit in Gurdaspur fell along the route that was marked in the GPS, devices implying that these areas may also have been targets. Punjab DGP Sumedh Singh Saini said 11 unused bombs had been recovered and five of them had been defused.

Three AK-47 rifles, 17 magazines, 55 cartridges, one rocket launcher, three hand grenades, bulletproof jackets, night vision devices and a heap of unused bullets were recovered from the site of the encounter.

The fact that the terror module crossed over from the Punjab side of the International Border and not in the Jammu sector has raised alarm in New Delhi as it clearly indicates that “Pakistan’s ISI is making a desperate bid to open the Punjab route to infiltrators, given the double-layered BSF line of defence in Jammu”.

“The terror module also enjoyed some local support. The Laskhar may have activated sleeper cells in the area and the Punjab police is probing this angle,” a top official said.

What is also raising hackles in the security establishment is the  uncertainity over whether there exists a “second terror group” that is still at large and may try to strike in some locations before August 15. The government has roped in the NTRO to study the GPS device further. According to the GPS report accessed by this newspaper, one set had 12 coordinate points fed in it and the second had three. Out of the 12 coordinate points in the first GPS set, the end point was at the railway track where live IEDs were planted by the terror module.