NEW DELHI/GUWAHATI: At least 68 people were killed and hundreds injured yesterday in serial bomb explosions that ripped through towns and markets in India’s northeastern Assam state. The first of 13 bombs went off around 11:30 a.m. under the Ganeshguri overpass near the high-security administration complex housing the state’s assembly building. This was followed by explosions at Paltan Bazaar and Fancy Bazaar in Guwahati. Around the same time, bombs went off in crowded market places in Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon and Barpeta districts. The blasts took place within an hour.
At least 470 people were injured when explosives-laden cars and auto-rickshaws blew up, Subhash Das, a senior official in the state’s Home Ministry, said. One hand grenade was also responsible for an explosion.
Pankaj Goswami, a witness in Guwahati, said: “The impact of the blast was so huge, a packed bus got half burned and we pulled out a lot of injured people and sent them to hospital.”
A curfew was imposed in Guwahati after crowds, angry at delay in rescue efforts, attacked police, ambulances and fire trucks and set cars on fire. Police fired into the air to disperse them.
The explosions in Guwahati injured more than 300 people and the city’s hospitals were overwhelmed by the influx of casualties.
Officials were quick to blame the region’s largest separatist group, the United Liberation Front of Asom, which has been fighting for secession for decades. “The needle of suspicion is on ULFA,” said Assam government spokesman Himanta Biswa Sharma. ULFA released a statement denying it was involved in the blasts.
“Going by the nature, planning and magnitude of the blasts we need to find out if ULFA has been assisted by other terror groups ... at home or abroad,” said Das.
While opposition parties blamed the blasts on intelligence failure and security lapse, the federal government dismissed this. “No, there is no intelligence failure in this case. Even after intelligence reports, intensive policing is needed to avoid such tragedies,” Minister of State for Home Shakeel Ahmed, also a spokesman for the Congress party, said.
Suggesting that the blasts were linked to recent communal conflicts in Assam, he said: “There were communal clashes in different parts of Assam on Oct. 3 and Oct. 5 in which at least 57 people were killed and 225,000 made homeless. Such acts of terror are the result of politics of hate that is being spread in different parts of the country.”
The blasts were condemned across South Asia. “I am confident that the people of India will rise unitedly against these attempts to disturb peace and harmony and to destroy our social fabric,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a statement.
Pakistan condemned the attacks and called for international cooperation to tackle strikes by militants. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon strongly condemned the bombings. Michele Montas told a press briefing at the United Nations that Ban, currently on an official visit to New Delhi, “strongly condemns this act of terrorism targeting civilians.” “There can be absolutely no justification for such indiscriminate violence,” she added in a statement.
The attacks came six weeks after the Indian capital New Delhi was hit by a series of bombs in crowded markets that left more than 20 dead. Those blasts were claimed by a group calling itself the Indian Mujahedeen.
In the past two decades, more than 10,000 people have lost their lives to insurgency in Assam, which is known for its tea, timber and oil reserves.
Public support for the ULFA has dwindled in recent years after a series of attacks in public places that claimed heavy civilian casualties.
Non-Assamese people make up nearly one-quarter of the remote state’s 26 million people. The state has 800,000 people from Bihar state, many of whom have lived in Assam for decades.
In January 2007, police blamed the ULFA for a wave of attacks in which 62 people were killed, mainly Hindi-speaking migrant workers.
Peace talks between the ULFA and the government fell apart in 2006. Since then the rebels have kept up their attacks.
Violent insurgencies have wracked India’s northeastern states — known as the “seven sisters” — for decades. More than 50,000 people have been killed in insurgency-related violence in the region since India’s independence in 1947.
— With input from agencies
