India's fragile relationship with Pakistan has been badly damaged by the attacks on Mumbai. Tensions between India and Pakistan have further escalated after claims by India that all 10 gunmen who attacked Mumbai killing more than 176 people, were from Pakistan. The terrorists who have been killed in these encounters were of Pakistani origin. India claims all the nine terrorists shot dead by army commandos for laying siege to Mumbai's two luxury hotels - the Taj Mahal and the Oberoi-Trident - and a nearby Jewish centre, after a 60-hour gun battle, belonged to the al-Qaeda-associated Lashkar-e-Taiba group based at Mudrike near the southern Pakistani city of Lahore.
Pakistan and India have suffered a tense relationship punctured by sporadic outbursts of violence. The attack on Mumbai threatened to further strain the two countries relations. Though India has not directly accused Islamabad's civilian government of involvement in the strike but has expressed deep frustration over its neighbour's inability, and unwillingness to prevent armed militant groups from using its territory to train and launch attacks on Indian targets. Indian politicians are demanding that Pakistan's government act decisively to get rid of the violent Islamist extremists operating on Pakistani soil.
Attacks in Mumbai have once again landed India and Pakistan in an embarrasing face-off. The new lull in the relation has cemented the fear of the failure of the joint anti-terror mechanism. Pakistan is feeling the heat not just from India but around the world and it is now making efforts to prove itself.
The rapidly rising tensions could scuttle a tentative peace process between the two nuclear-armed countries and even lead to a military confrontation, but some experts say they thought this might have been the aim of the terror operation.
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