On reflection, the Mumbai attacks stink of gross ineptitude both on the part of the political leadership and administration in Maharashtra and Delhi. The elite National Security Guards force is based in Delhi, the centre of India’s politics, as if that is the only city in India that deserves protection.   The commandos could not leave immediately because their plane was in another city.  If this is not hopeless crisis management, ask any corporate head what is.

For a full ten hours or so after the start of the Mumbai attacks, its topmost police officials were nowhere on the scene, except for the three top officers who perished in the gunfire. The top-most officer by rank at any of the sites was a sole deputy commissioner of police at Taj Mahal Hotel. The top brass arrived at the scene after daybreak and an investigation into their whereabouts until then would be revelatory.  If the entire political and administrative set-up were to be judged by corporate accountability standards, more heads would need to roll and not just of the three politicians. 

In the past few years, Mumbai has been a target of repeated terror attacks.  Yet, the city that is the engine of the country’s economy has no crack force to fight terrorism.  In the 12 months gone by, there have been at least a dozen terrorist attacks in cities such as Bangalore, Jaipur and Hyderabad. The chief ministers of most states have woken up to petition the central government and its byzantine bureaucracy to station commando units in their cities.

... contd.