Who could be India’s Obama who could unite the country and march the nation forward at a traumatic time? US business magazine Forbes feels it is industry captain Ratan Tata.

“While it (India) has the sympathy of the world (after the recent attacks), India could have an Obama moment’one in which a leader, whose personal history epitomises the country’s principles, marches forward to unite the country during its very moment of trauma. India has a chance now to get it right, but it needs a strong, credible leader to step up,” Forbes said in a report.

“As an American, I don’t get a vote in India, but if I did, mine would go to Ratan Tata,” added the report written by Forbes magazine’ Senior Editor (Asia) Robyn Meredith.

“He is not a politician, but he is the country’s most respected business leader. His Tata Group owns the Taj hotel that was just attacked, but his family is just as connected to India’s proud history as its shell-shocked present,” Meredith wrote in a weekly column published online.

Posing the question whether should there be not a way to involve Tata at the highest level in the government, the report noted that “a fractured India” would immensely benefit from his acumen and constructive patriotism.

Meredith pointed out, “Should there not be a way to involve him in government at the highest level? A fractured India would benefit immeasurably from his acumen, his managerial skills, and his very obvious’but always constructive’patriotism.”

Wondering what if the nation leapfrogged America’s approach, the magazine pointed out that the political leap could be as successful as the country’s technology.

Enlarge Photo Women light candles during a vigil held for the victims of Mumbai’s recent attacks, in…

Fri, Dec 5 10:11 AM

Indian newspapers said on Friday the government had proof that Pakistan’s military spy agency was involved in the Mumbai attacks, including evidence supplied by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“The Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) connection was clear and evident,” the Times of India quoted Indian intelligence sources as saying. The ISI is Pakistan’s main spy agency.

The Hindu newspaper said investigations into the Mumbai attack had led to the names of handlers and trainers of the Islamist gunmen and the locations where the training was held. These were believed to be military or ISI men.

At least 171 people were killed in the attacks last week in Mumbai. Nine of the attackers were killed while one is being interrogated.

The detained man told investigators he had attended four training camps in Pakistan over the past 18 months, Mail Today newspaper said.

He has said he is a member of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based group blamed for previous attacks in India.

The attacks have increased tensions between India and Pakistan. New Delhi says militants based in Pakistan were involved in the attacks, and has demanded that Islamabad hand over 20 of its most wanted fugitives.

The prime suspect for the Mumbai attacks is Lashkar-e-Taiba, an Islamist group fighting Indian rule in disputed Kashmir, and which analysts say has had ties with Pakistani intelligence in the past

Enlarge Photo Closed circuit television footage released on December 3, 2008 shows gunmen walking across a parking…

Several attackers may have survived the three-day siege of Mumbai that killed 171 people last week, analysts said on Thursday.

“I think there are more. My sources say (there were) at least 23 of the gunmen,” said Farhana Ali, a former CIA and Rand Corp counterterrorism analyst and expert on militant networks. Ali, who most recently visited India and Pakistan last month before the attacks, said her information came from Pakistan, but declined to further identify the source.

“If that’s true, that makes one wonder why we haven’t seen more attacks. Are they lying low?” she said “I think they (Indian authorities) are bracing themselves for more,” she said.

Ali spoke at a briefing for U.S. government counterterrorism and military officials, and others. It was sponsored by the Counterterrorism Foundation, which supports research and publication on terrorism issues.

A security scare at the New Delhi airport early on Friday New Delhi time, in which media reported a shootout after what India’s NDTV described as two sharp sounds, underscored the country’s raw nerves. NDTV said a police sweep turned up nothing unusual and a Reuters witness said operations appeared normal.

Indian authorities have said 10 gunmen took part in the Mumbai attacks last week. But reports early in the attacks cited police as estimating there were 25 gunmen.

‘WAIT AND SEE’

Authorities captured one, who was interrogated, and killed nine. Indian and U.S. officials blame the attacks on Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a Pakistan-based group that the United States in May designated a terrorist organization.

A U.S. counterterrorism official told Reuters, “Is there a possibility that some LeT terrorists are still out there? Yes, but we have to wait and see because all of the information is not in yet.”

David Kilcullen, who has served as a senior counterterrorism adviser to U.S. Gen. David Petraeus and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said he agreed that were probably more attackers.

They equipped themselves with fake identification and wore Western clothes with clean-shaven faces, indicating they probably did not view the attack as a suicide operation, Kilcullen said. “The fact that they lost nine out of 10 identified attackers killed doesn’t necessarily indicate that it was intended to have all those people dying,” he said.

“The Indians said there were 10 attackers, based on the fact that they captured one and killed nine — you have to assume there are more out there,” he said.

He noted, however, that there was no short-term follow-up attack on a target such as a hospital treating victims — a characteristic of some Iraqi insurgent strikes.

The fighters had high-level professional training, Kilcullen said. They entered the city by sea, launched diversionary strikes, and seized two hotels and a Jewish center, where they held off authorities and rampaged for three days.

“A Seal team would have had trouble mounting this operation,” Kilcullen said, referring to U.S. Navy commandos regarded as among the most skilled special forces.

(For the latest Reuters news on India, see http://in.reuters.com, for blogs see http://blogs.reuters.com/in/ and for videos see http://in.reuters.com/news/video)