By LYDIA POLGREEN and SOUAD MEKHENNET

KARACHI, Pakistan - Ten months after the devastating attacks in Mumbai by Pakistan-based militants, the group that carried out the assault remains largely intact and determined to strike India again, according to current and former members of the group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and a range of intelligence officials.

Despite pledges from Pakistan to dismantle militant groups operating on its soil, and the arrest of a handful of operatives, Lashkar has persisted, even flourished, since 10 recruits killed 163 people in a rampage through Mumbai, India’s financial capital, last November.

Indian and Pakistani dossiers on the Mumbai investigations, copies of which were obtained by The New York Times, offer a detailed picture of the operations of a Lashkar network that spans Pakistan. It includes four houses and two training camps here that were used to prepare the attacks.

Among the organizers, the Pakistani document says, was Hammad Amin Sadiq, a homeopathic pharmacist, who arranged back accounts and secured supplies. A formal trial began September 26 in Pakistan for him and six others, though Indian authorities say the prosecution stops well short of top Lashkar leaders.

Indeed, Lashkar’s broader network endures, and can be mobilized quickly for spectacular attacks with relatively few resources, according to a dozen current and former Lashkar militants and intelligence officials from the United States, Europe, India and Pakistan.

In interviews with The Times, they painted a troubling portrait of Lashkar’s capabilities, its popularity in Pakistan, and the support it has received from former officials of Pakistan’s military and intelligence establishment.

Pakistan’s chief spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, or I.S.I., helped create Lashkar two decades ago to challenge Indian control in Kashmir, the disputed territory that lies at the heart of the conflict between the nuclear-armed neighbors.

Pakistani officials say that after 9/11 they broke their contacts with the group. No credible evidence has emerged of Pakistani government involvement in the Mumbai attacks, according to an American law enforcement official.

But a senior American intelligence official said the I.S.I. is believed to maintain ties with Lashkar. Four Lashkar members, interviewed individually, said only a thin distance separated Lashkar and the I.S.I., bridged by former I.S.I. and military officials.

One highly placed Lashkar militant said that the Mumbai attackers were part of groups trained by former Pakistani military and intelligence officials at Lashkar camps. Others had direct knowledge that retired army and I.S.I. officials trained Lashkar recruits as late as last year.

“Some people of the I.S.I. knew about the plan and closed their eyes,” said one senior Lashkar operative in Karachi who said he had met some of the gunmen before they left for the Mumbai assault, though he did not know what their mission would be.

The intelligence officials interviewed insisted on anonymity while discussing classified information. The current and former Lashkar militants did not want their names used for fear of antagonizing others in the group or Pakistani authorities.

But by all accounts Lashkar’s network, though dormant, remains alive, and the possibility that it could strike India again makes Lashkar a wildcard in one of the most volatile regions of the world.

India and Pakistan have fought three wars since they were created by the bloody partition of British India in 1947.

A new attack could reverberate widely through the region and revive nagging questions about Pakistan’s commitment to stamp out the militant groups that use its territory.

It could also dangerously complicate the Obama administration’s efforts in Afghanistan. Success there depends in part on avoiding open conflict between India and Pakistan, so that Pakistan’s military can focus on battling the Taliban insurgents who base themselves in Pakistan.

Even so, American diplomatic efforts to grease India-Pakistan relations have been stillborn. So sensitive is the Kashmir issue that Indian officials bridle at any hint of American mediation. Meeting on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, the two sides failed to restart talks recently, with India demanding greater steps by Pakistan to prosecute those responsible for the Mumbai attacks.

If there is one thing intelligence agencies on both sides of the border agree on, it is that the consequences of a new attack by Lashkar could be devastating.

“We do fear that if something like Mumbai happens in India again, there might be a military reaction from the Indian side and it could trigger into a war,” said one senior intelligence official in Pakistan. “Right now we cannot guarantee that it will not happen again, because we do not have any control over it.”


A militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, is said to have organized the Mumbai attacks in Millat Town.


Another attack like the one in Mumbai that killed 163 people in November could spark a wider conflict between Pakistan and India.