Hindu nationalist leaders demanded yesterday that new peace talks with Pakistan be canceled after a bomb blast in a crowded bakery in western India killed nine people and wounded 57.
The explosion on Saturday, caused by a bomb left in an unattended bag, was the first major terrorist attack in India since the 2008 Mumbai massacre that killed 166 people.
It ripped open the German Bakery in the city of Pune. Thick patches of blood and severed limbs littered the popular hangout, which is close to a meditation retreat and a Jewish center officials say were previously scouted by a terrorist suspect now detained in the US.
“I came running to the bakery after hearing the explosion. I found people lying all over the place,” said Abba More, who lives nearby.
Security forces were put on high alert yesterday at airports, train stations and markets nationwide.
Hindu nationalist leaders blamed the attack on Pakistan and demanded the government call off the Feb. 25 peace talks, the first between the two since the Mumbai siege.
“India’s initiative to hold peace talks with Pakistan is misconceived and adventurous,” said Arun Jaitley, a top leader of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
He said India shouldn’t restart peace talks until Pakistan stops allowing terrorists to base themselves there and punishes those involved in the Mumbai attacks.
There was no immediate response from Pakistan to the claims.
Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram visited the bakery and the wounded in hospitals yesterday. He told reporters investigators were trying to determine what explosives were used and how the bomb was triggered.
The blast occurred at 7:30pm on Saturday after one or two people posing as customers left behind a backpack containing a bomb, officials said.
“It appears that an unattended package was noticed in the bakery by one of the waiters who apparently attempted to open the package when the blast took place,” Pillai told reporters.
The bakery is about 200m from the Osho Ashram, a renowned meditation center that Pillai said had been surveyed by David Headley, who is facing charges in Chicago for allegedly scouting targets for the Mumbai attack.
Chidambaram said Headley had also observed the Chabad Jewish center near the bakery.
One foreigner was among the dead, but his nationality was not immediately known, Home Secretary GK Pillai said, adding thatthree Indians, four Iranians, two Sudanese, one Taiwanese, one German and two Nepalese were among the wounded.
TAIWANESE LINK
Taipei Economic and Culture Center (TECC) in New Dehli Representative Weng Wen-qi (翁文祺) said yesterday that the injured Taiwanese was a 48-year-old man, surnamed Huang (黃), who had been having a meal at the bakery when the bomb went off.
He has been hospistalized for a leg injury and was being looked after by friends, Weng said.
The TECC had contacted Huang by telephone, Weng said, adding that no Taiwanese had been reported killed in the blast.
Should Huang’s relatives want to leave for India and take care of him, the India-Taipei Association (ITA) had agreed to issue visas immediately, Weng said.
Weng said the TECC in New Dehli had asked the Taipei World Trade Center Liaison Office in India, which is about a two-hour drive from Pune, to monitor the situation.
Weng said the TECC in New Dehli would suggest the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issue a travel alert to India because the Indian government had raised its security level.
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