It has been praiseworthy. An important objective of a terrorist is to intimidate the government and the general population. Our people have never let themselves be intimidated. One saw it after the Mumbai blasts of March, 1993, and July, 2006, after the Coimbatore blasts of February, 1998, and after the attack on the Parliament in December, 2001.

How optimistic are you at the dawn of a New Year?

I am neither hopeful nor alarmist. Both indigenous and international terrorism will continue at the same level. Possible scenarios: attacks on public transport, energy security and economic targets. There could be spells of mass casualties or mass economic disruption, but the terrorists will ultimately find that they cannot intimidate civilised societies. Defiant and unyielding towards terrorists and their organisations and sympathetic and attentive to the problems and grievances of the communities from which they have arisen should be our guiding principle in tackling terrorism.

B Raman is additional secretary (retired), Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, New Delhi.

Image: Rescue workers search for bodies inside the mangled compartment of one of the blast-affected local trains at Mahim railway station in Mumbai in 2006.

Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Also read: The Mumbai Blasts Homepage

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