It was the year 1956. Lal Bahadur Shastri, who later became India’s Prime Minister, was then the Minister of Railways in the Jawaharlal Nehru ministry.
Two significant train accidents occurred that year, claiming many lives. Shastri, taking moral responsibility, offered to resign on both occasions. While Nehru did not accept Shastri’s resignation after the Mahbubnagar train accident, he did so after the Ariyalur train accident in Tamil Nadu, which took place just three months after the one in present-day Telangana.
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Accidents occur on roads, trains, and in the air. Errant bird flights leading to aircraft hits, stray cows, heavy downpours, and even inebriated driving have resulted in tragedies. Both the Mahbubnagar and Ariyalur train accidents were not premeditated, nor were they guided by a sinister, anti-India foreign hand.
However, Lal Bahadur Shastri took moral responsibility and resigned from his position as the Minister of Railways. It took far more than mere conscience to do so. What’s more, in both the aforementioned train accidents, there was no hint of Pakistani or anti-India perpetrators, as stated earlier. There was no question of intelligence failure. Both train accidents happened as a result of torrential rains—acts of God.
Yet, Lal Bahadur Shastri resigned.
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Almost 70 years later, 26 innocent civilians died in Kashmir’s Baisaran meadows. They were innocent tourists, some of whom, it is reported, were on their post-nuptial holiday. Kashmir was experiencing a pickup in tourism, and the elections to Jammu & Kashmir were peaceful. The world felt that the Valley had finally put fear and terror behind it. But destiny and envious eyes ordained otherwise. Terror struck just six months after Omar Abdullah’s new government took office.
In 1956, tragedy visited two places in India because nature fated it. But on April 22, 2025, the innocent people did not meet their end due to torrential rain. Their deaths were ordained in Pakistan months ago by a group of anti-India terror actors. The meadows of Baisaran had been identified, reconnoitered, and clinically mapped for the April 22nd attack by Pakistan’s “two Asims” (Pakistan army chief, Asim Munir, and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence chief, Asim Malik). Indeed, it was Asim Munir who had orchestrated the attack on a CRPF convoy when 40 paramilitary personnel were killed on February 14, 2019, in Pulwama.
The objective this time had other motivations, including distracting attention from Pakistan’s failed state status, a possible coup d’état against Munir, and a deep conspiracy involving China and Pakistan in dual concert. But it was also propelled by a savage glee to instill insecurity among 150 crore patriotic Indians and to drive a wedge between well-meaning religious communities coexisting peacefully in India.
However, Pakistan succeeded in neither of its objectives. Kashmir or Kaziranga (or the elegant climes of Cherrapunji or the backwaters of Kerala) will continue to attract the rest of India. Nor can the motivation to divide Indian brethren ever win.
It is also true that India of 2025 (immediately after the Baisaran carnage) sought revenge against Pakistan. Indeed, the Indian armed forces (the only organization in the country with both a sense of duty and a conscience) carried out successful surgical strikes against terrorist camps billeted inside Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and inside Pakistan.
The Government of India made the correct moves, economically and militarily. It was also done with patience and precision. It did not act in haste but in a calibrated manner after weighing all the pros and cons. The air-strikes of May 7, 2025, had to be undertaken. After all, the country had experienced great distress as a result of Pakistan’s barbaric act. The families of the victims wanted concrete, visible action, even if it meant India waging war against Pakistan. The operational response should ideally have been to systematically track down the terrorists who were still hiding in the immediate aftermath of the attack in the Meadows of Baisaran.
Pahalgam is quite far from the Line of Control. It was impossible that they could have gone back to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) so quickly. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has identified one Sheikh Sajjad Gul as the mastermind of the Baisaran attack. According to another report, one Asif Sheikh of Tral near Pulwama and another Adil Thokar of Bijbehara of Anantnag district were part of the five-member death squad.
But the Indian intelligence has not been able to track down any of the five, even (at the time of writing on July 17, 2025) after almost three months. Instead, a limited war was launched against Pakistan, which by a convincing yardstick, was fair. Terror-sponsoring Pakistan had to be taught a lesson. Indeed, India achieved its objective when it destroyed nine terror camps in PoK.
However, it is unfortunate that innocent civilians were killed in Poonch and nearby areas as a result of relentless Pakistani artillery shelling and drone strikes, and there continues to be speculation about losses incurred by the Indian Air Force and the army. Indeed, some among many were of the opinion that war was not the answer to a terror attack. Instead, New Delhi should have taken a page out of Israel’s book and replicated the manner in which it tracked down the perpetrators of the Munich massacre of 1972.
Pakistan, despite the losses it has suffered, will continue to support terrorism against India. They did so in Assam (recall the ISI operatives whom the Assam Police arrested in 1999-2000!), they have done so when the Indian parliament was sought to be stormed, they did so in Mumbai on 26/11 and in Pulwama. Almost three months ago, they perpetrated the terror in Pahalgam. In fact, the atmospherics in the Indian subcontinent have become more conducive for anti-India action. The manner in which a rogue Bangladesh is mouthing effrontery about the Northeast seems indicative of a sinister agenda. China has showcased itself primarily as an observer in the drama being played out. But the fact that it carefully watched the “effectiveness” of its armaments in combat reveals that it played an important role behind the curtains.
The long and short of the article’s essence is that a complete overhaul of India’s top intelligence apparatus has to be undertaken. The old school failed to comprehend the larger picture by which India is being compromised time and again. The present head of internal intelligence just does not have the ability to think “out-of-the-box.” The days of traditional intelligence engineering are over. Today, a country that has been repeatedly afflicted by terror must know the imperatives of the three ocular sights. These, apart from the technologies and gambits (as in a game of chess!), are a “satellite’s point of view,” a “room’s point of view,” and an “ant’s point of view.”
It is only a sophisticated combination of the three aforesaid views that would bring forth the clairvoyance and the sophistication that India needs to attain and achieve at this time in its history. There is a clear need to “ring out the old, ring in the new.” The country needs a set of fresh attire in its wardrobe of internal intelligence.
Lal Bahadur Shastri resigned because of torrential rains. How should the Government of India act? Should it take a page out of Shastri’s courageous act?
Now that the Lt. Governor of Jammu & Kashmir, Manoj Sinha, has admitted to intelligence failure for the dastardly terror attack in Baisaran, the Government of India must take immediate steps to sack the person in charge of internal intelligence in India and ensure that the person is disgracefully drummed out of the government. The person must also be dismissed from service without delay. It has been a telling moment for the Government of India that the person was allowed to continue to shamelessly head an agency even after almost three months have passed since 26 innocent people lost their lives in Baisaran.
The Lt. Governor’s admission leaves no room for conjecture. There must be no delay. After all, even as the conscientious trio of Modi-Shah-Rajnath took the bold step and exacted correct punitive action against Pakistan and the terror actors it sponsored, it would be fitting that the person responsible by way of failing to anticipate the attack is suitably punished. The person in question is as much to blame for the gruesome deaths as are the five murderers who are still at large.
Furthermore, the person who has blood on his hands must be summarily held responsible for failure to carry out his duty, and his pension should be cashiered. Indeed, even the Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, Omar Abdullah, has called for “fixing responsibility” for the intelligence failure (https://www.deccanherald.com/india/jammu-and-kashmir/better-late-than-never-that-jk-l-g-admitted-intelligence-failure-for-pahalgam-attack-omar-3631395).
It is unfortunate that human memory is not only short, but that newer concerns overtake earlier failures, mishaps, and disasters. In fact, it is in the reprehensible playbook of the person who failed (and in the case of Baisaran, the failure is comparable with the same terror actors who perpetrated the murders) the people of India that they try their utmost to engineer new concerns in order to distract attention from grievous past blunders. But the people of India will not be misled. Nor will they forgive.
The people of India, particularly the families of the innocent persons who were murdered in Baisaran, pause for a reply.
Jaideep Saikia is India’s foremost strategist and bestselling author.