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EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, JUNE 3: A powerful bomb exploded in the heart of Chandni Chowk this afternoon, injuring at least 28 persons including four policemen, who were manning a post about 10 feet from where the site of the blast. Except for one, all the victims are out of danger.
The blast left behind a knee-deep crater next to the police post, ripped out one side of the small structure, shattered windows in the surrounding buildings, even up to 100 metres away, and smashed cars and two-wheelers parked in the vicinity.
Although CFSL experts are yet to ascertain the exact composition of the explosive, Police Commissioner V N Singh, who reached the spot soon after he heard about the explosion, said a battery, some wires and a timer have been recovered from the spot. Unlike in the previous explosions that rocked Delhi in 1997 and early 1998, no shrapnel was used in this device, which accounts for the fewer injuries. Also, preliminary investigations have indicated that RDX wasn't used.
So far, no one has claimedresponsibility for the blast. The police are yet to zero in on any group, or any connection with the explosions in Punjab and inside a local train in north-west Delhi earlier this year. But they have two suspects, of whom they have prepared an identity kit based on eyewitness accounts.
According to one eyewitness, Sunil Jain, around 2.30 pm, a turbaned man in his mid-thirties and wearing a white kurta and matching trousers, came to Ghantelwala Halwai an eatery owned by Jain's relatives at Fountain Chowk. He was accompanied by a clean shaven-man, in his early forties and wearing a white shirt and a pair of black trousers. They were carrying a red bag.``They ate a couple of bread pakoras, paid the bill and left in a hurry. One of the employees noticed they had left behind their red bag just outside the eatery,'' says Jain. The employee pointed this out to the owner of the shop, who asked him to hand it over to the policemen in the post on the opposite side of the road. ``There were two bomb blasts in ourarea in November 1997 (three persons were killed and 70 injured). Since then we have kept a watch on strangers and unclaimed belongings. We regularly hand over such articles to the police.''
And so it was almost another routine affair for the Nepalese employee of the eatery to hand over the bag to a constable inside the police post. The constable carried the bag to the post-in-charge sub-inspector Inder Kumar Jha.
``Though there were were some clothes inside, the bag looked suspicious. Then I heard the ticking sound,'' said Jha, who is being treated at Ram Tirath Hospital for loss of hearing and injuries on his arms and legs. ``My colleagues were already calling up the bomb disposal squad. As I looked deeper into the bag, I found a battery operated device with red and blue wires.'' He adds: ``I then rushed out of the police post with the bag in my hand, shouted across to people to clear away and then threw it towards the clearest area.''
Moments later, at 2.55 p.m., even as the bomb disposal squad wereon their way, the bomb exploded. The blast was deafening. Jha and three of his colleagues were flung across the road. So was a rickshaw puller and his rickshaw. And 21 others.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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This story was printed from Net Express located at http://www.expressindia.com. Net Express provides a portal to India, with news from The Indian Express and The Financial Express along with sites on travel and tourism, the entertainment industry, the power sector, the environment and much more.
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