Special Day Post
On December 13, 2001, the Parliament of India was attacked by terrorists. The perpetrators belonged to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) - two Pakistan-raised terrorist organizations. The attack resulted in the deaths of six Delhi Police personnel, two Parliament Security Service personnel, and a gardener – in total 9 – and led to surged tensions between India and Pakistan, which resulted in the 2001–02 India–Pakistan standoff. The 5 terrorists were also killed outside the parliament.
On 13 December 2001, five terrorists infiltrated the Parliament House in a car with Home Ministry and Parliament labels. More than 100 people, including major politicians, were inside the parliament building at the time. The gunmen used a fake identity sticker on the car they drove and thus easily breached the security deployed around the parliamentary complex. The terrorists carried AK47 rifles, grenade launchers, pistols, and grenades. They drove their vehicle into the car of the Indian Vice President Krishan Kant (who was in the building at the time), got out, and began shooting. The Vice President's guards and security personnel shot back at the terrorists and then started closing the gates of the compound.
Constable Kamlesh Kumari of the Central Reserve Police Force was the first to spot the terrorists and was shot by them as she raised the alarm. She died on the spot. One gunman's suicide vest exploded when he was shot dead; the other four gunmen were also killed. The ministers and MPs escaped without any hurt. The total number killed was 9 and at least 18 other people were injured in the attack. Delhi Police stated that five terrorists carried out the attack and the names given by them were: Hamza, Haider alias Tufail, Rana, Ranvijay, and Mohammed - who were allegedly members of Jaish-e-Mohammed - were killed.
Delhi Police officials said that gunmen got the instructions from Pakistan and the operation was conducted under the proper guidance of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency. In their book The Exile: The Flight of Osama bin Laden, Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy state that then-CIA station chief Robert Grenier and Ambassador Wendy Chamberlin suspected that the ISI had approved the attack in order to force the redeployment of troops under the command of Ali Jan Aurakzai away from the Durand Line, allowing Osama bin Laden to escape into Pakistan during the Battle of Tora Bora.
The attack triggered extensive investigations which revealed the involvement of four accused, namely Mohammad Afzal Guru, Shaukat Hussain Guru (cousin of Afzal Guru), and S.A.R. Gilani (Syed Abdul Rahman Gilani) and Shaukat's wife Afsan Guru (Navjot Sandhu before marriage). Some other proclaimed offenders were said to be the leaders of the banned terrorist organization known as Jaish-e-Mohammed. Charges were framed under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 (POTA), and the Explosive Substances Act by the designated sessions Court.
Accused 4, namely Navjot Sandhu a.k.a. Afsan, was acquitted by the session court of all charges except one under Section 123 of CrPC for which she was imprisoned for 5 years. Others accused were given death sentences under various offenses. However, on appeal, the high court subsequently acquitted S. A. R. Geelani and Afsan but upheld Shaukat's and Afzal's death sentence.
In the same year, a similar kind of attack was also led down on the assembly in Srinagar, Jammu, and Kashmir, during November, in which 38 people were killed by the terrorists.