Kerala - Kozhikode   

Reports of bomb squad awaited

Biju Govind

Reports of the bomb squad are awaited Police do not rule out role of extremist outfits

ON THE TRAIL: The bomb squad and local police inspecting the site of the blast at the Moffusil Bus stand in Kozhikode on Friday. - Photo: S. Ramesh Kurup

Kozhikode: Preliminary investigations into the bomb blasts in the heart of the city, one at the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) bus station and the other at the Mofussil bus stand, have revealed that these incidents were a meticulously planned operation aimed at testing the efficiency of the police and district administration in dealing with the situation.

Senior police officials said that the District Collector's office received an anonymous call from a Public Call Office at around noon stating that a bomb would go off at the KSRTC bus station in half an hour. Mohandas, Personal Assistant to District Collector Rachna Shah, attended the call. He transferred the call to Additional District Magistrate (ADM) P. Koyakutty as Ms. Shah was not in the office.

The ADM, in turn, informed Assistant Commissioner of Police (North) K.P. Venugopal. Soon a police team led by Nadakkavu Circle Inspector K. Abhilash went to the bus station. A bomb attached with a timer device hidden in a garbage heap near the KSRTC Workers Cooperative Society went off around 12.45 p.m., during the search operations.

A second anonymous call was received at the office of the Calicut Times, an evening daily, at 12.30 p.m., warning that a bomb planted at the Mofussil bus stand, which is half-a-kilometre away from the KSRTC Bus Station on Mavoor Road, would explode within half an hour.

The reporter who attended the call informed the Special Branch . The call was from a coin-operated telephone. A team of police personnel led by Kasaba Circle Inspector Shaju C. Joseph evicted the people from the eastern side of the bus stand where a bomb-like object was lying. However, a policeman and an INTUC worker sustained minor injuries in the blast which occurred at 12.55 p.m.

City Police Commissioner H. Venkatesh told The Hindu that two cases had been registered at the Nadakkavu and Kasaba police stations in connections with the incidents. Circle Inspectors K. Abhilash and A.J. Babu would investigate the cases. Detonators had been used to explode the devices made of firecrackers and other materials, including iron pieces and stones.

So far no one had been arrested. The reports of the bomb squad were also awaited, he said.

He did not rule out the possibility of some extremist outfits attempting to create panic among the people at the elections times. "We are also examining other aspects like attempt to divert the attention of the people from contemporary issues." Raids are being carried out at bus stands, railway stations and the grama panchayats coming under the jurisdiction of the City Police, including the coastal areas of Marad , Mr. Venkatesh said.

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