India will retaliate strongly if there was one more terrorist attack on it originating from Pakistan, said Union home minister P Chidambaram in the sharpest message yet on the issue.

“If terrorists and militants from Pakistan try to carry out any attack in India, they will not only be defeated but will be retaliated very strongly,” the Home Minister said at a public meeting in Madurai Saturday night.

Coming close to a year of Mumbai attacks on November 26, experts said the statement showed there was a plan in place.

“It shows they (government) have some responses in place (if such an attack took place),” said Uday C Bhaskar, former Director of Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses.

But Pakistan was not impressed.

Its foreign ministry spokesman Abdul Basit told HT, “It’s desirable that India should respond to our positive gesture and the proposal to set up the joint anti-terror mechanism to deal with terrorism.”