28 injured in grenade attack in Jammu bus stand, three critical

Jammu, Mar 7: Suspected terrorists on Thursday carried out a grenade attack in the crowded general bus stand area in the heart of the city, injuring 28 persons, three among them critically, officials said.

This is the third grenade attack by terrorists in Jammu bus stand since May last year, viewed by security agencies as an attempt to disturb communal harmony and peace in the city.

"So far 28 persons were brought with splinter injuries. Three are critical, of whom two are being operated," Principal, Government Medical College (GMC) hospital, Sunanda Raina told PTI.

Inspector General of Police, Jammu, M K Sinha said preliminary investigation suggested that someone lobbed the grenade in the bus stand area around noon, causing the explosion.

The scene of the blast along B C Road was sealed off by police and a massive hunt has been launched to nab the grenade thrower, Sinha, who immediately rushed to the scene to take stock of the situation, told reporters.

A parked bus of the state road transport corporation (SRTC) suffered extensive damage in the blast which caused panic among the people.

"Whenever there is heightened state of alert, we strengthen checking and frisking but there is always a possibility of someone slipping through and this one seems to be a case like that," the IGP said.

"Obviously the intention is always to disturb the communal harmony and peace," he said and requested the people to maintain calm.

The IGP said the police is collecting the evidence and "we are sure to hunt him down (the attacker)."

Immediately after the explosion, people ran to safety and later as the situation returned to normal evacuated the injured to the hospital.

Police parties along with sniffer dogs and forensic experts rushed to the spot and launched a search operation to nab the attacker, officials said, adding the operation was still going on when last reports were received.

However, no one was arrested in connection with the blast so far, they said.

Earlier on December 28-29 last year, suspected terrorists carried out a grenade attack on the bus stand with the intention to target the local police station building, an attack which took place seven months after another grenade attack along the B C Road left two policemen and a civilian injured on May 24, 2018.

"The blast occurred on the roadside when there was huge rush of people. I had come to drop my wife who was going to board a bus to Punjab," one of the injured, Kuldeep Singh of the Pragwal area of the city, said.

Singh, who is undergoing treatment at Government Medical College hospital for splinter injuries in lower parts of his body, said he felt that somebody hurled something which caused the powerful explosion.