BANGALORE/PUNE, 31 December 2005 — Two days after a gunman opened fire at a science conference killing a professor and injuring four delegates, a letter threatening bomb blasts has kept India’s IT hub Bangalore on high alert.
In the letter addressed to police and published in part in local newspapers yesterday, a man calling himself Moinuddin warned there would be bomb blasts on New Year’s Eve at a five star hotel and at the home of Karnataka state’s chief minister.
Police have yet to receive the letter which was sent to newspapers but despite regarding it as a likely hoax were taking no chances.
“We have not received any such fax or message. At the same time, we do take such threats, even if hoax, seriously and prepare for any eventuality,” a top police official told AFP, asking not to be named.
“We continue to maintain high alert in the city and across the state,” said B. S. Sial, police chief of the southern state of Karnataka, of which Bangalore is the capital.
Meanwhile, in the aftermath the attack by suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists in Bangalore, security was beefed up to the highest alert level in Pune, and police patrolling has been intensified. Pune is home base to top level defense installations and scientific centers. The city is headquarters of the Southern Command and also of various military engineering, intelligence units, army development and research establishments.
And in a major political development, former Shiv Sena leader Raj Thackeray, yesterday morning met BJP leaders Atal Behari Vajpayee and Lal Krishan Advani on the last day of the BJPs silver jubilee convention in Bombay.
Emerging after 30 minutes of his meeting with the BJP leaders, Raj said he had come to seek their blessings and there was no political significance of the meeting.
