Mumbai Massacre Update: It Still Isn't Over Yet (The Read International for 11/27/08)

Photo from Associated Press

CNN is now reporting that 125 people are dead, though the BBC is still at 101 for the moment.

One of the terrorists was arrested, and he told the Mumbai police the details of the attack:

Ismail alias Zakiruallah, a Punjabi from Faridkot in Pakistan who was arrested by the Mumbai police on Wednesday night during the terror attacks, is giving interrogators the complete story of how the sensational terror operation was planned and executed.

He has told the Mumbai police that he has been trained by the Lashkar e Tayiba, said police sources while giving chilling details of the most daring terror attack in India that has so far killed 101 people -- and the horror story is not over, yet.

Rediff.com, with help of political and governmental sources in New Delhi [Images] and Mumbai, including from intelligence, has pieced together the government's thinking on the matter.

Later in the article, an unfortunate piece of information regarding a possible lack of preparation for these terrorists attacks was revealed:

As it has happened many times before, according to sources in the home ministry, in the third week of September India had received information from American sources that there could be a large-scale operation within India by the Lashkar e Tayiba. A source in the home ministry also claimed that the Research and Analysis Wing had passed on this information to the Intelligence Bureau and in turn they had sent this information to the Maharashtra police.

Again, some six days later, the information was circulated from New Delhi to Mumbai police that hotels in Mumbai will be targeted by the Lashkar. The police source claims that the name of Taj Mahal Hotel was specifically mentioned. Accordingly, the hotel's security had been increased but in two months time that have fallen into a routine, it seems.

Also, on the basis of vague information the local police has no time to build up the entire case of a possible terror act, says the same source. Since information like this is vague, the police now claims that it is very difficult to act upon it.

And as mentioned before, the story will continue to unfold.