Bombings in Western India; 29 Dead
Ahmadabad, India tries to recover after a day of deadly bomb blasts. The bombs exploded on Saturday, near a hospital and a busy marketplace. The bombings have left 29 people dead and about 88 people injured. The bombs are said to have struck the southern technology hub of Banglore.
Though there are no immediate claims of those responsible, suspicions have fallen on Muslim militants who were blamed for several previous attacks. These attacks include bombings in 2006 that destroyed Mumbai's commuter rail network. Nearly 200 were killed that day.
Reports say that there were at least 16 bombs that went off Saturday evening in many of the neighborhoods of Ahmadabad. Ahmadabad is a crowded, but historic city which hosted the scene of several of the worst riots between India's Muslim minority and it's Hindu majority in 2002.
The bombs went off in two separate flows -- The first one was near a busy marketplace and left some of the dead sprawled among the streets and stands and in public squares. The second, went off by a hospital.
The side of a bus was partially blown off and its windows had shattered completely. Another vehicle was completely swallowed by flames. Most blasts had taken place in narrow lanes of the older parts of Ahmadabad -- these lanes are tightly packed with small businesses and homes.
Dogs trained to sniff out bombs and such had scoured the areas that were hit by the blasts.
The city's hospital was crowded with the wounded and their relatives. One of the wouned was a mere 6-year-old boy whose father had died in the blasts. His arms are covered in bandages and there are wounds on his face as he lays in a hospital bed recovering.
The chief minister of the Gujurat state -- Narenda Modi -- where Ahmadabad is located, had called the bomb blasts "a crime against humanity." He had said that the bombing had seemed to have be masterminded by a certain group(s) who "are using a similar modus operandi all over the country."
A junior minister in the prime minister's office -- Prithviraj Chavan -- had called these explosions "deplorable" and had said they were set off by people who were "bent upon creating a communal divide in the country". -- language that officials usually use to blame the Islamic militants.
These attacks by the militants are believed to be attempts to provoke violence between the Hindu majority and the Muslim minority of India.
Federal Home Minister, Shivraj Patil told reporters in New Delhi that "Anti-National elements have been trying to create panic among the people of our country. Today's blasts in Ahmadabad seem to be part of the same strategy."
Fears of a violent cultural divide were amplified by the history of Ahmdabad's 2002 riots between Hindus and Muslims. The violence had killed 1,000 people; most of them were Muslims. The riots were triggered by a fire that had killed 60 passengers on a train which was packed with Hindu pilgrims. Many Hindu extremists had blamed these deaths on Muslims and rampaged through Muslim neighborhoods. The cause of the fire remains unclear.
The government has put out an alert warning in the other cities of India of the possibility of attacks similar to those that had struck Bangalore and Ahmadabad.
"On Friday, seven synchronized small bombs killed two people and injured at least five in Bangalore. On Saturday, police found and defused an eighth bomb near a popular shopping mall in Bangalore." said the director general of police in Karnataka state, Srikumar where the city is located. Srikumar, like many Indians, only uses a single name.
