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India admits knowledge of imminent bomb strikes

Date: February 23 2013

Ben Doherty

IN THE aftermath of the Hyderabad bomb blasts that killed 14 people and injured 119, blame is being attributed in two directions: at an Islamist terrorist organisation for allegedly carrying out the attacks and at India's security forces for failing to prevent them.

Bombs on bicycles, used in Thursday's attacks, are a trademark of the Indian Mujahideen, which has used the tactic at least seven times before.

But the Indian government has conceded it knew a terrorist attack was imminent and police have known for months that the Dilsukhnagar district of Hyderabad, where the bombs went off, was a potential target.

No group has claimed responsibility for the blasts , and the government has been careful not to apportion blame too early, given the delicate political situation with Pakistan. But it is understood Indian authorities believe the Indian Mujahideen is responsible.

The group is a proscribed Islamist terrorist organisation, reportedly linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba. Its leaders are believed to live in Pakistan.

Lashkar-e-Taiba is known for bombing crowded marketplaces, particularly using ammonium nitrate, although the pentaerythritol tetranitrate reportedly found in the residue of Thursday night's blasts is more commonly associated with terrorist groups from the state of Jammu and Kashmir.

The homemade bombs were stuffed with nuts, bolts and nails, another Indian Mujahideen signature.

The attacks were timed within five minutes of each other, about 150 metres apart, in the east of Hyderabad, a city famous as the hub of India's computing industry and which hosts the Indian offices of Google, Microsoft and other IT multinationals.

The first bomb exploded just after 7pm in front of a snack bar near a cinema. As the dense crowd fled the scene, the second bomb went off near another cinema.

Dilsukhnagar is a predominantly Hindu quarter in a city of about 6 million people. It is an education and small-business area with scores of computer training centres, cinemas, restaurants and markets. There is a Hindu temple in the area where devotees gather on Thursdays.

The government had received intelligence warnings in the past two days that a terrorist attack was imminent, but there had been no information about a specific target, the Home Minister, Sushilkumar Shinde, said.

But police knew Hyderabad was a potential target.

Two Indian Mujahideen operatives, Sayed Maqbool and Imran Khan, arrested after a low-level bomb attack in Pune last year, told police three sites in Hyderabad had been scouted as potential targets. The reconnaissance was carried out on the orders of the group's chief, Riyaz Bhatkal, in Pakistan.

A police press release in October said: ''About a month before Ramadan in 2012, Maqbool helped Imran in doing a 'recce' of Dilsukhnagar, Begum Bazaar and Abids in Hyderabad. This was done on the instruction of Riyaz Bhatkal.''

Australia has issued new travel advice urging ''a high degree of caution in India at this time because of the risk of terrorist activity by militant groups''.


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