Commuter trains are the easiest target for terrorists, as we have seen in Madrid, London, and now Bombay. But it is difficult for a Westerner to comprehend the kind of overcrowding in a Bombay local train; they ferry six million passengers a day. A bomb that goes off in one of those compartments will have maximum impact.

The great thing about Bombay is its open, generous heart. I hope - I know - that this spirit will endure. Bombay will adjust.

I am an exile; citizen of the country of longing.

There have always been elements in the Pakistani state that have been hostile to India; which is not to say that the Pakistani government as a whole is responsible for bombing Indian cities. But I think there are entities in the Pakistani security services that operate more or less autonomously. Their role certainly needs looking into.

Each person’s life is dominated by a central event, which shapes and distorts everything that comes after it and, in retrospect, everything that came before.

The trains are central to Bombay just as the subway is central to New York; they are the great social laboratory of that city. And today, they became a charnel-house.

While I was writing my book, I got a top police official in Bombay an invitation to study terrorism at the Rand Institute in Washington DC. This would have helped the city enormously, as he was the detective who cracked the '93 blasts case. But the commissioner declined to let his subordinate take up the offer from Rand, because of his fear that it was CIA-affiliated. That culture of suspicion needs to change; India needs to learn how other democracies fight terror.