By IANS
Hyderabad : Police Monday claimed to have made progress in the investigations into the bomb blast at the historic Mecca Masjid here that claimed 16 lives, and said they were confident of cracking the case in a week.
"We have very good clues and will be able to crack the case in a week," Hyderabad Police commissioner Balwinder Singh told newsmen, while declining to share any information about the investigations.
To a question, he said it would be difficult to say at this moment which terrorist outfit was responsible for the blast on Friday.
Singh said a special investigation team had been formed to conduct the probe into the terror blast that had raised fears of violence between Hindus and Muslims in a city that has a large concentration of Muslims.
He denied any arrest had been made in West Bengal in connection with the case or a team of Hyderabad police had gone to that state for investigations.
Earlier, a report from West Bengal had said that two people were taken into custody for questioning in Asansol town. Police sources said the two were from Mihijam in Dumka district of neighbouring Jharkhand state.
Police here believe that the Bangladesh-based Harkat-ul Jihad Al Islami (HUJI) was behind the blast and its activist Mohammed Shahed alias Bilal, a native of Hyderabad, was its mastermind.
Bilal is believed to have triggered the blast from Bangladesh using sophisticated technology to detonate the Improvised Explosive Device (IED) filled with a mixture of RDX and TNT.
According to police, a phone call from anywhere in the world to a mobile attached to an IED is enough to trigger the blast.
On Sunday, a second mobile phone – a Nokia 6030 – was found from the water tank of the Mecca Masjid along with pieces of the explosive device that went off Friday killing 11 people and injuring many others.
Meanwhile, life returned to normal in the old quarters of Hyderabad.
The bustle resumed in the commercial hub around the mosque and Charminar, the famous monument that is a symbol of this 400-year-old city. Shops in the centuries-old markets selling bangles, bridal wear and pearls re-opened and buses of the state-owned Road Transport Corporation and private vehicles returned to the roads.
Police and paramilitary forces continued to be deployed in communally sensitive area as a precautionary measure. The police commissioner said the forces would remain for another four to five days.
No incident has been reported since Saturday, when a complete shutdown was observed to protest the blast and the police firing.