Terror In The Temple Town

Terror struck the temple town of Varanasi between 6:15-6:30pm (IST) when three bomb blasts in quick succession rocked Sankat MochanTemple and Cantonment Railway Station, leaving atleast 20 people dead, injuring over 50, some of them seriously.

The blasts were first reported to be two, one each at both the places, but AK Suri, the Director General of Railway Protection Force, later confirmedthat there was a third blast at the holding area of the platform at theVaranasi railway station. Sources claim that the Shiva Ganga Express which wasstanding there was thoroughly checked before it left for Delhi.

The modus operandi of the blasts was similar to the pre-Diwali serialexplosions in Delhi last year, according to union home Secretary V K Duggal asthe three blasts took place within a gap of ten minutes of each other, a patternadopted in the Delhi explosions on October 29 last year.

The worst hit was the railway station where 14 people were killed and 30injured in a powerful explosion outside the waiting room at 6:25 pm on platformone where Delhi-bound Shiva Ganga Express was stationary, official sources said.

Minutes before this, a bomb went off at the famous Sankatmochan temple whenit was teeming with devotees who were gathered in exceptionally large numbersbecause the evening aarti on Tuesday is a special day for Lord Hanuman. Atleast six persons were killed and 25 others injured in the explosion. There wasimmediate panic and a near-stampede situation because of the loud explosions asthose present, including old women and kids, scrambled helter-skelter to rushout to safety.

The blast at the railway station was so powerful that it created a one-footdeep crater and smashed window panes and wooden structures. The area wassplattered with blood and scattered with body parts and passengers belongingssoaked in blood. There was unconfirmed report of a second blast at the railwaystation.

All the injured were rushed to various hospitals in the city, many of them bygood Samaritans, as police cordoned off the sites.

Four live bombs were also defused near Dashaswhamedh Ghat, two kilometresaway from the Kashi Vishwanath temple. Immediately after the blasts, police wason high alert throughout the country with security beefed up at places ofworship, vital installations and government buildings. The centre also issued anadvisory to all the states to take steps to ensure law and order and tospecially see that there was no communal flare up.

The Uttar Pradesh government has announced acompensation of Rs five lakh for the dead and Rs one lakh for the seriouslyinjured. The BJP was quick to make political capital by upping the communaltension -- targeting the centre and its "soft" policies towardsterrorism and "minority appeasement politics" of the Samajwadi Partygovernment in Uttar Pradesh. L.K. Advani too pitched in by using the tragic and grave occasion to launch an attack onthe Congress, accusing it of indulging in "competitive minorityappeasement" and said this was "good neither for the country nor forthe community ... A little while ago I got the news of blasts in Varanasi. ThenI realised that my apprehensions are correct in the light of recentdevelopments. This is my belief that if political parties are encouragingminorityism and indulge in competition in this regard, particularly the rulingparty, its results would be beneficial neither for the country nor for thecommunity". He said he had told Pakistani leadership during his visit toPakistan last year and to U.S. President George Bush, when he visited India afew days back, that it was not correct to say that terrorism has been eradicatedin the country.

The home minister, Prime Minister, UPAchairperson and even the President were quick to react and understanding thegravity of the situation, while stronglycondemning the blast and expressing sympathy for the bereaved families, alsoappealed for calm and restraint. The home minister and PM also spoke to UP Chief MinisterMulayam Singh Yadav on the issue. The centre has placed 500 CRPF personnel atthe disposal of the state government for deployment in sensitive areas tomaintain law and order.

Shivraj Patil, the home minister, said it was an attempt by desperateelements to disturb communal harmony and peace in the country. "Thesituation is constantly being reviewed at the highest level. The government isin constant touch with the state government for any assistance they mayrequire," he said, as he and the UPA chairperson are rushing to Varanasifor an on-the-sport assessment of the incident and the situation arising out ofit.

Sonia Gandhi, UPA Chairperson, said in a message that "at this momentwhile all efforts are being made to identify those behind this dastardly deed,we must do our utmost to maintain social harmony and peace". She said theblasts were a "senseless act of violence" directed at innocentcitizens of the country. "My feelings are with the families who have losttheir near and dear ones in this tragedy." But the point to note should be that senseless these attacks are not, as they seem to have been planned to clearly appear to be a targeting of the Hindus by choosing the country's most prestigious Hanuman temple on a Tuesday, with the intent to provoke retaliatory attacks and communal trouble.

Apart from other minority bodies, the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) andthe Jamiat-Ulama-i-Hind (JUIH) have strongly condemned the blasts. "It is a shameful act and must be condemned in one voice by the wholenation. We express our grief and condole the death of such large number ofinnocent people," JUIH General Secretary Mahmood A Madani said in a releasetoday. "Any violence especially in a place of worship is mostcondemnable," he said, and added, ""We demand from the lawenforcement agencies to deploy every possible means to provide immediate reliefand security to the affected people and take full precautionary measures tomaintain peace and public order." And that, indeed, seems to be the crying needof the hour.

With agency inputs. After we had uploaded this story, the potential danger of the situation seems to have been realised even by the BJP as Mr Vajpayee has come out with a statement asking for calm and restraint.