Indian officials say the volatile south is a matter of concern and point to the latest suicide attack in Khost in which ten people were killed on Tuesday.

India has indicated that much will depend on NATO’s role and how effectively the US leans on Pakistan to check Taliban activity in the area. “If you want to tackle them (the Taliban) effectively, they must be controlled in the border area. That’s the work of NATO,” External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said while visiting Kabul, simultaneously signalling that Pakistan ought to show greater purpose.

Making the point that it was important to control the Taliban to secure Afghanistan’s future, Mukherjee said the re-emergence of the Taliban must be checked if the democratic process in Afghanistan has to be carried to its “logical conclusion.”

The Indians are aware that increased Taliban activity could also mean greater threat to the growing number of Indians in Afghanistan. In effect, they could be targeted. “The biggest threat to the Indians is kidnapping. We warn members of the Indian community where the danger lies,” an official said, referring to the killing of three Indians in recent months.

The danger zone lies along the 2,500 km common border that Afghanistan shares with Pakistan — and that includes Kandahar, Paktika, Khost, Nangarhar, Laghman, Kunar and Nuristan. In most of these areas, Indians have been involved in the country’s reconstruction.

The Pakistan link in the threat to Indians and to Afghanistan is, according to officials here, a clearly established one. “Almost every problem that we have here on the security issue is sponsored by Pakistan,” an official said.

In fact, Mukherjee, without naming Pakistan, said both India and Afghanistan maintain that cross-border terrorism is a major problem.

Signs of how seriously that threat is taken is reflected on the streets of Kabul. The capital city is heavily fortified, and even during heavy snowfall, there’s no let-up in the security drill. Every VIP movement sees all vehicles being stopped at short notice. At Kabul airport, there are at least four security checks, each checkpoint running independently of others, with vehicles made to go through four separate security checks.

Usually, emails are used to reach out to the Indian community. This is why the Indian Embassy here is so keen to develop a full-scale registry of Indians in the country. At the moment, over 3,000 are registered but there are thousands more and the Indian mission knows very little about them. Said one official, “It is absolutely necessary that Indians register with us to help us in tracking them, especially when there is a problem.”

There is general assessment that India’s growing involvement in Afghanistan’s development may be responsible for turning the spotlight on them. A “non-traditional donor nation”, India has the fifth largest aid package for the Afghans, and this is usually visible — among them involvement in key power projects.