60 dead in Indian bomb blasts

Seven bombs ripped through a centuries-old Indian city today, leaving at least 60 people dead.

The blasts struck within the old walls of Jaipur, a city in western India that’s known for its pink-hued palaces.

“Obviously, it’s a terrorist plot,” said A S Gill, the police chief of Rajasthan, the state where Jaipur is located.

“The way it has been done, the attempt was to cause the maximum damage to human life,” he said, adding an eighth bomb was found and defused by police.

Another senior Rajasthan police officer, A K Jain, said 60 people were killed and 150 wounded in the bombings.

No-one claimed responsibility for the attack, as is the case with most bombings in India. But within hours of the blasts, authorities were suggesting that blame would eventually fall on Pakistan and the Islamic militant groups New Delhi accuses it of backing.

“One can’t rule out the involvement of a foreign power,” said India’s junior home minister, Sriprakash Jaiswal, referring to neighbouring Pakistan.

Indian authorities have blamed Pakistan-based Islamic militant groups for a spate of bombings that have killed nearly 400 people in the predominantly Hindu country of 1.1 billion people since 2005. Pakistan, an overwhelmingly Muslim country, denies any role in the bombings.

The attacks have run the gamut from the July 2006 train bombings that left nearly 200 people dead in Mumbai, India’s financial centre, to small blasts like the one that struck a Muslim shrine in Rajasthan last year, killing two people.

Jaiswal suggested today’s bombings were connected to those previous explosions, saying “the blasts are part of a big conspiracy”.

Each new bombing has brought fears of a fresh outbreak of the violence between Hindus and Muslims that has sporadically bled India throughout its history, and authorities appealed for calm.

Shortly after the bombings, authorities put New Delhi, India’s capital, and Mumbai, the country’s financial centre, on high alert along with several other cities. Security was also quickly stepped up at airports and railway stations across the country.

The blasts hit a market near a temple dedicated to the Hindu monkey god Hanuman. Tuesday is the day of worship set aside for Hanuman, and the temple was packed with people offering prayers on the way home from work.

Another blast took place near the Johari Bazaar – the city’s jewellery market, a popular destination for tourists. The tourist season, however, ended in March and there were no immediate indications that foreigners had been caught in the explosions.

Parikshit Bhandari, who saw the attack near the jewellery market, said there was “blood all around and wounded people crawling on the ground”.

Television channels showed footage of mangled bicycles, damaged cars and overturned bicycle rickshaws, the most popular mode of transport in the crowded lanes of Jaipur.

The city is one of the major attractions in Rajasthan, a desert region dotted with palaces and temples that draw hundreds of thousands of Indian and foreign tourists every year, from bargain-hunting backpackers to celebrities like Sir Mick Jagger.