JAMMU/NEW DELHI - In the wake of intelligence reports indicating an increased threat to India from Pakistan based-terrorist groups in the run-up to and during the April-May general elections, Home Minister P. Chidambaram Wednesday asked political leaders to exercise ‘prudence’ and ‘restraint’ during their campaigning.

‘Political leaders have to be careful when they move around during election times. We have the example of good elections in Jammu and Kashmir, where the casualties were low… I advise political leaders to exercise prudence and restraint in their movements,’ Chidambaram said at a press conference in Jammu.

‘And I am confident that every one will be protected,’ Chidambaram asserted.

Indian intelligence agencies have intercepted ‘electronic chatter’ that indicates an increased threat from Pakistan-based terrorist groups in the coming months, government sources in New Delhi said.

‘There is an increased threat from Pakistan-based terror groups in the run up and during the elections,’ said highly-placed government sources. ‘There is increased chatter that points to heightened terror threat to India during this period.’

‘There could be an attempt to target major political leaders,’ the sources added.

The threat perception also emanates from evidence that Pakistan’s spy agency Inter- Services Intelligence (ISI) has not stopped doing business with anti-India terrorists, the sources said.

India last week replied to Pakistan’s 30 questions relating to the Nov 26, 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. It is awaiting ‘credible action’ by Islamabad to punish the perpetrators of the attacks and dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism in its territory.

New Delhi believes that the political turmoil in Pakistan should not distract from the process of bringing the perpetrators of the Mumbai atrocity to justice.

‘Certainly, we would hope that those things (bringing perpetrators to justice and dismantling terror infrastructure) would happen and happen as soon as possible and we will do everything we can to encourage that process,’ Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon had told reporters here Tuesday.

‘We will continue down that road with whoever is willing to help us to achieve our goal,’ Menon said.