ISSUE
Friday, March 28, 2025
Volume 16 . Issue 52
New Delhi: After the German Bakery blast in Pune marked the return of terror attacks in India, a special alert has been sounded in three cities-Delhi, Indore and Kanpur-on Sunday.
After his security review meeting here on Sunday, Home Minister P Chidambaram has issued a general advisory to all states, especially Delhi, Indore and Kanpur, to be on alert.
Also, the same day, Chidambaram met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to brief him on the Pune blast and the present status of investigation.
Earlier on Sunday, the Home Minister said India is pursuing with the United States to have access to arrested Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist David Headley, blamed for the 26/11 attack in Mumbai and believed to have been behind Saturday’s blast in Pune that left nine dead and 57 injured.
“The government of India is pursuing the case of access to Headley but it is tied up in lot of legal problems. He is being indicted by a Grand Jury in Chicago. But we have not given up our case that we must be given access to David Headley,” Chidambaram said after visiting the blast site in Pune.
He said terrorists Headley and Rana came to India prior to the Nov 2008 attack in Mumbai when there were intelligence lapses but none happened after that when Headley had come again in March 2009 once more to survey the targets and it was known.
He ruled out intelligence lapses since the Chabad House of the Jewish and Osho Ashram in the blast neighbourhood were surveyed by David Headley and it was known to the authorities as hard targets.
"This particular area has been on the radar for quite sometime," he said.
A blast ripped through a popular German bakery in Pune close to the famous Osho Ashram and a Chabad House of the Jewish community on Saturday evening killing and injuring many.
The Home Minister since the Osho Ashram was on the radar of the terrorists as a hard target and there was no intelligence failure, the terrorists chose a soft target like Germany Bakery nearby.
“This is an insidious bomb planted in a place. It is a soft target. It is very difficult to stop it unless you frisk everybody, which is difficult in an open society,” he said.
He said the local police had sensitized all establishments in the area after there was information on hard targets like Osho Ashram.
He said whether the German Bakery had put in place any security measure after the sensitization has to be found out.
He said the bag with the explosive was lying in the place for quite sometime but everyone in the crowded place thought it belonged to the other person.
Chidambaram said the ATS (Anti-Terrorist Squad) has taken over the case, constituted team and investigation is in progress.
He said forensic experts were flown in from New Delhi and from the army besides from Pune and they are gathering evidences and ascertaining the explosives used.
However, sources from the Home Ministry said RDX and ammonium nitrate were used in the bomb for a ‘powerful’ blast.
In New Delhi, Union Home Secretary G K Pillai meanwhile said no foreigner died in the blast and the report of a Taiwanese dying on Saturday was wrong.
Two foreigners- an Italian and an Iranian- were among the nine killed in Saturday's blast in a Pune backery, police said.
The dead were identified as Ankik Dhar, (24, Kolkata), his sister Anandi Dhar (19, Kolkata), their friend Shilpa Goenka (23, Kolkata), P Sundari (22, Bangalore), Vinita (22, Mumbai), Shankar (40, Pune), Nadia Macdrini (37, Italy), Gokul Nepali ( a staff of German Bakery), Sayeed Abdul Khan (26, Iranian student in Pune).
Satyapal Singh, Pune Police Commissioner, said of the 60 injured 12 were foreigners. He said 41 were undergoing treatment in hospital.
He said no one was detained in connection with the blast and there was no specific intelligence report about the blast. He said the bomb was kept in a haversack.
He also urged me not to crowd hospitals and meet the injured since it would hamper investigation and would be against national interest