I still remember reading about the first ever Improvised Explosive Device (IED) used by the Kashmiri militants in Srinagar. It was in 1990 and the device was improvised to work on the concept of pressure. Nails pierced in two wooden blocks with a newspaper used as a circuit breaker. The device did cause damages to security forces but not so noticeable.

With the passage of time, these IEDs kept improving and then came the Remotely Controlled IED (RCIED). It worked on radio frequencies and was initiated by handheld radio sets or with the help of mobiles. However, there was never any major IED attack in Kashmir which would have caused so many casualties to Security forces as it happened in yesterday’s suicidal attack in Pulwama.

There have been causalities in the past too but mainly due to fire and physical assault by the terrorists. Like the Mumbai attack, Jammu Railway Station, Samba military camps, Uri, Gurdaspur and Pathankot Airforce station. Many instances are there when a vehicle has been used as a bomb, the worst one being in 2001 when 38 people were killed at Srinagar Secretariat, mainly police personnel and staff members. However, it was in Dec 2000, when a car bomb was used in a suicidal mission against Army at Badami Bagh Cantonment. It was again JeM who had taken the responsibility for the attack.

But yesterday’s attack where one vehicle loaded with 300 kgs of RDX rammed into a bus, which was part of a vehicle convoy carrying troops to Jammu and accounted for 49 human lives of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), gives out the real intentions of JeM who have been succeeded in motivating a youth in this suicidal attack.

This attack is certainly bigger than Uri, and Azhar Masood’s outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) has claimed the responsibility as usual. But what is more worrisome is that the terrorist who blew himself up in the attack was a local Kashmiri youth who had joined JeM last year only. It shows the kind of radicalization which has seeped in, in the mind of youths.

This fight is no more for the freedom of Kashmir but it has now become a fight of ideologies which is perhaps being suitably exploited by Pakistan, Taliban & ISIS.

This phenomenon needs to be checked and at the earliest before Kashmir turns into another Syria or Yemen. Mastermind and conspirators for this gruesome attack need to be identified and punished at the earliest. Hijbul Mujahideen being almost wiped out and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT) having taken the back seat in Kashmir due to dried up resources from Pakistan after the FATF allegations, JeM has emerged as the most trusted group for the Deep State in Pakistan in their nefarious agenda. So, it is very important for India to ask World Forum topressurize China against shielding Azhar Masood, sheltered by Pakistan, from being declared as the global terrorist like Hafiz Saeed.