Abstract

The al-Qa’ida attack on the USA on 11 September 2001 heralded a decade in which Indian concerns with terrorism were highlighted at the international level. Analysts argued that al-Qa’ida and its linkages with the Taliban meant that ‘the headquarters of international terrorism has moved from West Asia to the Subcontinent’. ¹ The Indian discourse on international terrorism is clearly reflective of its concerns with cross-border terrorism perpetrated by terrorist groups based in Pakistan with connections to al-Qa’ida. More recently, the appearance of support groups based in Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka has resulted in the spread of terrorism from specific geographic locales to urban centres in India. ²