By IANS
Guwahati : A powerful explosion ripped through a marketplace in Assam’s Karbi Anglong district Thursday, leaving 28 people injured, 15 critically. A minister addressing a public meeting nearby miraculously escaped unhurt, the police said here.
The blast took place at Howraghat in Karbi Anglong, about 290 km east of Assam’s main city of Guwahati. “The bomb was strapped to a bicycle parked at a marketplace where Hill Areas Development Minister Khorsing Ingti was addressing a meeting,” a senior police official said by telephone.
The venue of the minister’s meeting was about 100 metres from where the blast took place. “Twenty-eight people, most of them either shoppers or vendors, were injured in the explosion,” the official said.
Fifteen of the injured were stated to be critical and were shifted to hospital.
The police suspect the Karbi Longri National Liberation Front (KLNLF) or the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) to be behind the blast.
“The KLNLF or the ULFA militants could be responsible for triggering the blast,” the official said.
The KLNLF is a rag-tag rebel outfit fighting for a homeland for the majority Karbi tribe in Karbi Anglong district of Assam.