India has rushed elite security forces to its western state of Gujarat after an intelligence report said that about 10 militants might have crossed over from Pakistan, police said on Sunday.
Security has been strengthened at all major installations in the coastal state following a warning from the central intelligence authorities, Gujarat State Police director-general PC Thakur said.
“A team of NSG [Indian National Security Guard] arrived in Gujarat last night following the terror alert. The state has been put on high alert,” Thakur told reporters.
TV footage showed security men frisking visitors outside hotels, cinema and malls.
In a notification issued by the Gujarat home department and seen by reporters, all top police chiefs were asked to return to duty immediately and report any suspicious activity.
Thakur said central authorities feared that members of banned militant groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba might have infiltrated the sate via the Kutch district, which has a land and sea border with Pakistan.
India blames Lashkar-e-Taiba for the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people. Pakistan’s government has announced a ban on the group but a number of prominent members, including Hafiz Saeed and Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, remain free.
Gujarat, the home state of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was also rocked by a series of bombings in 2008 which killed at least 45 people.
In 2002 the state was torn by religious riots which killed more than 1,000 people, most of them from the minority Muslim community.
India has fought three wars with its nuclear-armed rival, two of them over the disputed Himalayan territory of Kashmir.
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