Check on terror routes and bodies

“We had a very vague idea of the route they took and any investigation would have been incomplete without getting a fair idea of that,” Pradhan said.

“Mumbai is a huge city with a number of roads and lanes. Not many living outside the city has a good knowledge of its geography. Another purpose of this visit was to clarify such doubts,” he said.

Pradhan was accompanied by policemen,some of whom had been at the spot during the attacks. “It is always a good idea to be escorted by the local police,who have a good understanding about the roads of the city,” said Pradhan.

The committee will draft a report on the visits and submit it to the state government by the weekend. “We will report whatever information we have gathered. This can later help us during the investigations as we do not have a sequence of moves made by the terrorists,” said Pradhan.

The state government had constituted the committee in the last week of December. Retired IPS officer V. Balachandran is the other member on the panel. The committee’s task is to probe the strike and fix the responsibility for slips in handling the situation in its aftermath.

Chief Minister Ashok Chavan had put forth the idea in the Assembly on the last day of the Nagpur winter session. Chavan had said that the panel would investigate the incident and the management of the ensuing crisis by the police officers and the state administration.

Ram Pradhan has served as Governor of Arunachal Pradesh besides being the Union Home Secretary in the mid-1980s during the tenure of then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. He is an IAS officer from the Maharashtra cadre and has played a crucial role in the peace processes in Assam and Mizoram. This later culminated in the signing of peace treaties with militant groups in the Northeast.