In his first press conference after the Mumbai attack, Mumbai Police Commissioner Hassan Gafoor on Tuesday gave official confirmation that Ajmal Ameer Kasab, the only terrorist captured alive, is a Pakistani national and attributed the entire attack to persons who were on a “suicide mission”.

Addressing both the national and international press, he said, “The person caught alive is certainly a Pakistani. The terrorists were trained for the attack by ex- army officials for over a year,” he said without naming a country. “The motive for the attack was to create maximum sensation,” he added.

“The mother ship which got them is indeed from Karachi, after which they hijacked an Indian fishing trawler and later used a rubber dinghy to walk up to the shore,” he said. He added that five groups of two carried one bomb each, of which two were planted in the cabs, one outside Taj, one outside Oberoi and one outside Leopold Café.

The investigation is also looking into the telephone intercepts of the terrorists as well as the usage of local SIM cards tracked to Delhi and Kolkata which were found in the trawler Kuber. Cash to the tune of Rs 5,400 along with some foreign currency was found on Kasab.

Gafoor said that the men were instructed to unleash terror and create maximum possible mayhem. “At Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus, they were instructed to take a strategic location on top, which they could not find and hence they moved towards Cama,” he explained.

... contd.