CALCUTTA, 16 August 2004 — Separatist rebels killed 22 people, most of them schoolchildren, in a bomb attack yesterday on an independence day ceremony in India’s northeast.
The children aged between 10 and 14 years were taking part in a parade in a far-off corner of insurgency-racked oil- and tea-producing state of Assam when a powerful bomb ripped through a college ground.
Several guerrilla groups in the northeast had called for a boycott of independence day ceremonies.
Tens of thousands of soldiers were placed on alert across the country and authorities closed off airspace over New Delhi, where Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a public speech, to ward off possible attacks during the celebrations.
A witness said most of the bodies of the children were burned beyond recognition in the blast in Dhemaji, 350 km from Guwahati, Assam’s commercial center.
“The bomb exploded under the feet of the children. There is blood and human flesh all over the ground,” said school teacher Jiban Saikia.
Eight women, who brought their children to the college parade ground, were among the dead, police Inspector General Khagen Sharma said.
Twenty-one others were wounded in the explosion that occurred as the parade was about to start.
“There was panic with people running all over the place crying for help,” government official Jatindra Nath said. “Scores of people were bleeding profusely.”
Doctors at the town’s lone hospital fought to save the lives of the wounded. Seven were flown for treatment to an adjoining town. “A 12-year-old boy was brought with one of his limbs dismembered and another girl was totally blinded,” said Dr. Biju Baruah.
Hundreds of residents, angered by what they saw as poor security, pelted police and officials at the parade ground with rocks and sticks after the blast and troops fired in the air to disperse them. “Many police officers and civilians were injured in the clashes,” said local legislator Dilip Saikia.
None of the separatist groups claimed responsibility, but the blast bore all the hallmarks of a United Liberation Front of Assam job. “ULFA triggered the deadly blast to assert itself before sitting at the negotiating table with New Delhi’s representatives to discuss its demands”, a top army officer in Calcutta’s Fort William, headquarters of the Indian Army’s Eastern Command covering insurgency-racked Assam, told Arab News.
On Monday, ULFA agreed to meet Indian government representatives to discuss Assam’s “sovereignty”, apparently at the behest of Naga rebels who have held several rounds of peace talks with New Delhi.
ULFA has climbed down from its earlier position to hold talks only outside India in the presence of UN mediators. “After the climb-down, ULFA wanted to tell its cadres and sympathizers that it had not buckled down under pressure and its firepower was intact. Hence the blast,” the army officer said.
— Additional input from agencies
