Massive police station explosion in Kashmir kills nine and injures 32 | World | News

At least nine people were killed and 32 others were injured when confiscated explosives exploded at a police station in Indian-controlled Kashmir, police said on Saturday. The explosion took place in the Nowgam area of ​​the district’s main city, Srinagar, late on Friday when forensic experts and police were examining the material, the district’s director general of police, Nalin Prabhat, said. He dismissed the possibility of foul play, calling it an accident.

Authorities said the dead included six police and forensic officials, two civil administrators and a civilian. Some of the injured remained in critical condition. The huge explosion set the police station and many vehicles on fire. A succession of small explosions delayed emergency rescue efforts, according to the Press Trust of India news agency.

The police station incident follows Monday’s deadly car explosion in New Delhi, which killed at least eight people near the city’s historic Red Fort. Indian authorities described the incident as a “heinous act of terrorism” carried out by “anti-national forces”.

The car blast occurred hours after Kashmir police announced they had busted a suspected militant cell operating in the disputed region, arrested at least seven people, including two doctors, from Indian cities and seized a large cache of bomb-making materials in Faridabad, near New Delhi.

Indian security agencies have since carried out a series of raids in Kashmir as part of the car blast investigation; He questioned hundreds of people and detained many people.

Indian police said on Saturday they used DNA to identify the driver of the car as a Kashmiri doctor. Government forces destroyed his family’s house in the southern district of Pulwama on Thursday night, officials said.

In the past, soldiers have demolished the homes of suspects accused of ties to militants fighting against Indian rule in Kashmir as punishment.

Police transported the explosive material seized in Faridabad to Kashmir for investigation and stored it “safely in an open area” at the police station, where the investigation into the suspected militant cell began last month, according to senior official Prabhat.

When the explosion occurred, a team of experts took samples for forensic analysis and said it was an “accidental explosion”, Prabhat said.

He said: “Any further speculation as to the cause of this incident is unnecessary.”

Locals said the explosion was heard from miles away in Srinagar. Some victims’ body parts were recovered from nearby houses located more than 100 meters from the police station. Many houses were also damaged.

Local resident Bashir Ahmed said: “The explosion created a deafening noise that shook houses and squeezed open windows shut.”

About a dozen relatives of Mohammed Shafi Parray, who lost his life in the explosion, gathered at his house in Nowgam and marched to the police station in protest, chanting “We want justice” slogans.

One of Parray’s relatives, who did not give his name, said the deceased, a tailor by profession, was summoned by the police on Friday night. “Why did (the police) take him away?” he shouted.

A local police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with the ministry’s policy, said the tailor was called to the police station to sew bags in which samples of explosives would be stored.

India and Pakistan administer part of Kashmir, but both claim the entire region.

Militants in the Indian-controlled part of Kashmir have been fighting against New Delhi’s rule since 1989. India insists Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. Pakistan denies the accusation and many Kashmiris see it as a legitimate fight for freedom.