BOMBAY/NEW DELHI, 24 May 2005 — A controversial Bollywood film was withdrawn yesterday from cinema halls across the country after twin bomb blasts in New Delhi theaters Sunday.

Police said it was not clear whether there was any connection between the film, “Jo Bole So Nihaal”, and the blasts that killed one person and injured more than 60 others.

The explosions took place at the Satyam and Liberty cinema halls in the heart of New Delhi within 20 minutes of each other at around 8:30 p.m. when the halls were packed with weekend moviegoers.

As police hunted the Sunday’s bombers, a small blast yesterday wounded one person in Delhi, where Sikh separatists carried out a wave of bombings in the 1980s.

No group has claimed responsibility for Sunday’s blasts.

“The city is still in a state of high alert. It is too early to say who is responsible. Investigations are going on. Our specialized agencies which deal with terrorist incidents have been put in service,” said Ravi Pawar, Delhi police spokesman.

Analysts said violence was unlikely to escalate but security agencies would have to be on guard.

“If you have a cocktail of religion and...violence you have to quarantine it quickly,” C. Uday Bhaskar, head of the Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses, said.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh condemned the attacks and visited the injured in hospital yesterday. He appealed to people to stay calm and said the government was taking all steps to ensure peace and security in the capital, Manmohan’s Media Adviser Sanjay Baru said.

The film was released on Friday amid protests from Sikhs who objected to its title. Top Sikh religious body, Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC), said the title “Jo Bole So Nihaal” misused a popular term only spoken in Sikh temples or on the battlefield by Sikh warriors.

The SGPC yesterday demanded an inquiry into the blasts, and its chief Bibi Jagir Kaur said, “SGPC strongly condemns the inhuman blasts, which were an attempt to show the peace-loving Sikh community in a bad light.”

Kaur criticized the government for its poor security and held it responsible for the blasts, saying it did not act in time to stop the screening of the film, the PTI news agency reported.

Cinema hall owners were taking no chances and the film was withdrawn indefinitely yesterday in cities such as Pune, Nasik, Baroda and Bombay in the west, Madras in the south, Calcutta in the east, and Lucknow and Dehra Dun in the north.

Security was beefed up even in cinema halls where the film had not been screened.