'This operation was impossible without the help of Dawood'

Former joint director of the Intelligence Bureau Maloy Krishna Dhar tells SHOBHITA NAITHANI that unless politicians wake up to the crisis, we will continue to be hit

This is the 11th attack. Why doesn't India have a strong security policy in place?
Our country is facing a lot of problems. Kashmir has a different problem; the Northeast a different one; the Maoist insurgency is a different one. In addition to all this, there are incidents of terrorism by foreign sources in collaboration with indigenous sources. You require separate policies to handle each of those problems. A national policy should be based on the security perception of the nation and not on the basis of religion. Our politicians give a lot of weightage to religion and caste.

But why is the government laid-back about it?
There is no political will in the Centre and most of the state governments have towake up to this emergency-like situation. They work with the attitude of a fire brigade commander – when there is a fire, they will only go and douse it.

But the question that everyone wants an answer to it – Why can't the government pre-empt a situation like this?
As far as Maoists are concerned, the government is not going for land reforms and rural industries. They are not integrating the rural and the urban economy. How does it matter if you send battalions and battalions of policemen? They would get lost in the forest. It is an issue of social economy. Similar is the case with Northeast. There is ethnic insurgency. There is a lot of social, economic, ethnic and political imbalance. They have to be resolved through administrative and political action. The incident in Mumbai is a mercenary attack. They have plotted it very well.

In that case, a lot of preparation must have been put into an operation of such magnitude…
Oh yes. I'm definite that without the help of Dawood Ibrahim, this would not have been possible. They couldn't have known such details about the hotels.

How is it possible that there is rarely any prior information about impending attacks?
It's simple. The problems are so many. The resources very little. The Intelligence Bureau itself requires about 100 percent increase. The main problem is with the state intelligence. It's an eyewash. You must have a dedicated, well-trained intelligence cadre in the state. And you must not make them do any policing work but only intelligence gathering.

For an attack like this, which you say was extremely well planned, did the IB or the Home Ministry have any inkling?
IB is not responsible for anything outside the boundary of India. That's the work of Research and Analysis Wing (RAW).

So you think there has been a failure?
I should say there has been a failure. They should have known all these things. But ask the government why they didn't. I don't work with them any more.

What should be done to prevent further attacks?
The state intelligence and the marine security has to be strengthened. You cannot be slack about anything. Unless you imagine how much damage the aggressors can wreak on you and work on a strategy to fight them back, you cannot win. Our bosses must not forget the war time philosophy.