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They had diverse backgrounds. Some of them had participated in the
movement to build Ram temple in Ayodhya, some were associated with Rashtriya
Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and later drifted from it, some participated in
anti-conversion campaigns, a few were accused of rioting in Gujarat in 2002 and
others were just criminals but they all believed in militant
Hindutva and also that Muslims and Christians were abusing the generosity of
India.
In the early 2000s, they slowly began to find cohesion and came out
as a bunch of loosely coordinated groups with pan-India reach targeting
Malegaon (2006 and 2008), Samjhauta Express train, Hyderabad's Mecca Masjid and
Dargah. But for the support and strategic vision provided to them, they would
have remained local ruffians or Hindutva tough men making aggressive speeches
saying 'Muslims from across the border are attacking our temples and somebody
needs to reply' or at the most they may have assassinated political opponents
or attacked Christian missionaries.
Almost none of them had the intelligence to think of Malegaon,
Samjhauta Express or Mecca Masjid or the acquitted accused in the Parliament
attack case SAR Geelani as targets. So the question is who turned them towards
targeting these places and people? The ideologue of the group to a great extent
was Swami Aseemanand, who allegedly propagated the 'Bomb Ka Badla Bomb Se'
theory but investigators believe that a few others also shaped their thinking.
So far investigators have found at least three groups of Hindu
extremists active in Madhya Pradesh (MP), Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh (UP).
And they don't discount the possibility of a still undetected separate group
working in Delhi. Two blasts in Delhi - Jama Masjid (April, 2006) and Mehrauli
(September, 2008) are yet to be solved and Hindu extremists are prime suspects
in both cases.
Investigators have found that over five dozen people participated in
a training camp in Raigad near Pune, Maharashtra in 2004. Besides having
recruits from Maharashtra and MP, some came from other states as well. At least
two of the participants in the Raigad camp died in a bomb making exercise in
Kanpur in August, 2008, say investigators.
"We have reasons to believe that some retired military
officials trained these recruits from UP, Maharashtra, MP, and Jammu and
Kashmir in handling weapons and explosives," said a source. Hindu radicals
also held camps in Bagli near Dewas and in Faridabad, Haryana.
It was a potent mix - Hindutva tough men capable of murdering people
being trained in weapons and explosives and given a vision to attack high
profile targets. Investigators also believe that the groups in Maharashtra and
MP had some kind of coordination resulting in a series of attacks between
2004-2008.
The twin blasts in Malegaon and Modasa in September 2008 was the
last known operation of the Maharashtra-MP group. Due to persistent crackdown
by investigative agencies they have not been able to mount another. But
investigators still believe that many leaders and foot soldiers are out there.
