PUNE, INDIA — A series of bomb blasts killed at least 54 people Tuesday in one of India's most popular tourist cities, injuring scores of others and triggering panic in busy market areas, authorities said.
Eight explosions struck the western city of Jaipur within a few minutes of one another, starting about 7:30 p.m., authorities said. A.K. Jain, a top state police official, said today that at least 100 people were injured.
All of the blasts went off around the historic walled district for which the city is famous. Television footage showed pools of blood, empty shoes and wrecked bicycles outside storefronts that would have been crowded with evening shoppers. One of the bombs hit a Hindu temple dedicated to the monkey god Hanuman, on a day of the week when the temple attracts more worshipers than usual.
"Obviously it's a terrorist plot," said A.S. Gill, the top police official in the state of Rajasthan, of which Jaipur is the capital. Given their placement and timing, the bombs were planted to cause "maximum damage," he said.
Parts of the city were under curfew this morning.
It was the worst such attack to hit India since bombings in August in the southern technology hub of Hyderabad, which killed more than 40 people. New Delhi, the capital, and Mumbai, India's financial and entertainment hub, were put on heightened alert -- standard practice.
As often happens after such incidents in India, suspicion fell on Kashmiri militants who want the contested Himalayan region to be independent or part of Pakistan. On Sunday, after months of relative calm, gun battles erupted between the Indian army and suspected militants in Kashmir. Ten people reportedly were killed.
But there were no immediate claims of responsibility for Tuesday's bombings. Besides Kashmiri separatists, India is host to a number of other insurgent and armed secessionist groups. Bangladesh-based Islamic militants have also been mentioned as possibly behind the attack.
Analysts noted that the blasts occurred on the 10th anniversary of nuclear tests conducted by India in Pokhran, in the Rajasthani desert, not far from the border with Pakistan. Those tests, subsequently matched by Pakistan's own, announced the South Asian rivals as declared nuclear powers and drew international condemnation for sparking a nuclear arms race in the region.
