THE Indian government recommended setting up regional units after the November 26-29 Mumbai attacks, which saw 10 Islamist extremist gunmen kill 166 people and injure more than 300 others in a 60-hour killing spree.

NSG troops only arrived in India's financial capital on the morning of November 27 - some 10 hours after the first shots were fired.

Counter-terrorism experts say that any rapid reaction force should be on the scene within 30 to 60 minutes.

The slow response was blamed on organisational and logistical difficulties in getting commandos from their base south of Delhi to Mumbai, as the NSG has no aircraft of its own.

Mr Praveen Swami, a terrorism analyst and associate editor at The Hindu English-language newspaper, said the new regional units were 'a welcome but very, very small step.'

'It's at the sharp end that there's a real problem, the mundane, every day point of delivery,' he told AFP.

'When you have these large terrorist attacks, the real problem is not getting the special units in, it's been the first responders, the police and other emergency services, being able to deal with it.'

State governments were slowly realising the need to improve local policing, after a wave of Islamist extremist attacks across India last year, he added.

In Maharashtra, of which Mumbai is the capital, nearly 300 commandos are currently being trained for the state's new counter-terrorism unit, called Force One.

Meanwhile, five special squads of 200 Mumbai Police officers - all trained to use AK-47 assault rifles and equipped with bullet-proof jackets and vehicles - are to be stationed across the city as a rapid response force.

But problems remain: neither the 40,000-strong Mumbai Police - responsible for a city of 18 million - nor the NSG has its own helicopters for the quick transportation of officers and troops. -- AFP