New Delhi:
India's top security officer today said Pakistan had taken a "positive step" by detaining 26/11 Mumbai attack plotter Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, who was granted bail by a Pakistan court on Thursday.
"India has responded firmly on issue of Lakhvi and Pakistan has also responded. It is a positive step as far both nations are concerned. Pakistan is appealing in the high court," National Security Advisor Ajit Doval said.
His statement came as India asked Pakistan to ensure immediate reversal of bail granted to Lakhvi, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi said had come as a big shock.
In a statement in Parliament, PM Modi said India had "strongly conveyed" its view to Pakistan. Referring to the school massacre in Peshawar, he said, "The pain felt in India was no less than that felt in Pakistan. Every Indian had tears in their eyes. But immediately after that, this kind of behaviour has come as shock to all those who believe in humanity."
Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj said, "It is hard to believe there is lack of evidence against Lakhvi. We demand that Pakistan reverse this decision. We are keeping an eye on this issue."
On Thursday, an anti-terror court in Islamabad granted bail to Lakhvi citing lack of adequate evidence against him.
Lakhvi remains in jail under a special legal provision called the Maintenance of Public Order. The Pakistan government has detained him for three months and said it will appeal in the Supreme Court against the bail order, which came two days after Taliban gunmen killed 132 children in a Peshawar school and the country's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to root out terror.
India has pointed out that it has furnished material that includes voice samples of Lakhvi's phone instructions to the ten terrorists who sailed into Mumbai in 2008 on how to strike the city's biggest landmarks. Ajmal Kasab, the lone terrorist caught alive after the siege, had told Indian investigators that Lakhvi was the mastermind of the attacks, along with Hafiz Saeed, the founder of the terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba.