MUMBAI, India — The walls that the rockets blew out have not been repaired, and the plaster is a dense scattershot of bullet holes. Dozens of holes, blasted by grenades, pockmark the linoleum floors.
One year after the terror attack that left 166 people dead, the Chabad House — a once-popular site with Jewish travelers where six foreigners were killed — remains scarred, still and quiet.
In part, that silence is a symptom of how much remains unchanged since 10 militants with assault rifles fanned out across Mumbai last Nov. 26, attacking hotels, a train station and other targets, paralyzing India’s financial capital and shocking the country.
While Mumbai’s large hotels and important business centers have paid richly to improve their own security, many worry that the city as a whole remains vulnerable to another assault from Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistan-based group blamed for the attack, or other assailants. While India is trying the lone surviving gunman, Ajmal Kasab, Lashkar-e-Taiba’s leaders remain free in Pakistan.
“Nothing has changed to alter the vulnerabilities of Mumbai,” said Ajai Sahni, executive director of the Institute for Conflict Management in New Delhi. “The only institutions that can protect against terrorism are state institutions. They are failing to do so. As a result private institutions are being forced to spend large amounts of money on largely ineffective security.”
He blames the failure to beef up national security on weak-willed politicians, some of whom are corrupt and benefit from lax policing.
