At that time I was preparing for my 10th board exam and I was hopeful that India would do an Isreal like railed from Tajikstan side (where India had a small military base). But this never happened and India had to free 3 terrorists.
Indian authorities missed chance of stopping the plane at Amritsar due to inability of Indian officials to take decision. Many people says that Punjab Police waited for orders from Delhi. Some says that there were relatives of highly placed officials in the plane and so the order to storm the plan was not giver. We are yet to know the exact account of 50 minutes Crisis Management Group in Delhi.It is believed that the hijackers received an arms consignment in Lahore from ISI/Pak establishment.
UAE refuses to give permission to India to carry out military operations in Dubai. Americans also didn’t help India and refused to pressurize UAE to help India.When the plane landed in Kandahar which was under Taliban, then Taliban tanks and fighters sorrunded the plane. Taliban assured Indians that they have surrounded the plane to pressurize hijackers. But Taliban had positioned its tanks and fighters on behalf of ISI to give a signal to India not to try any military solution.
Pakistan which the behind the hijack didn’t give any permission to India to use its airspace to carry out military operations. The use of Chinese Airspace was not considered due to bad India China relationships. I am not sure why Iranian Airspace was not used to attack Kandhar.India had no time to take all the military planes and equipment to Tajikistan via Pacific Ocean and Russia. It would have taken at least a few days for Indian commandos to reach Tajikistan base. And Kandhar was deep inside Afghanistan from its northern boarder and any military operation from North might have resulted in heavy casualties.Around 150 Indians were at the mercy of hijackers/Taliban/Pakistan’s ISI.Americans had refused to help even with intelligence and Russians also didn’t help the way they should have helped.
India was virtually on its own and no powerful nation came forward to support India. No government would have afforded 150 coffins of passengers landing in New Delhi. So, Atal Bihar Vajpayee was left with no other options. It was perhaps the lowest point of India after 1962 war debacle. It was a great victory for Pak spy agency ISI and Indian Foreign Minister was forced to accompany three feared terrorists with himself.We must also consider that those were pre 9/11 days and terrorism was yet not a bigger global issue. Many countries were not supportive of Indian narrative that Pakistan was the epicenter of global terrorism.
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