Assam

At least five people were killed and 26 were wounded when suspected separatist militants set off three bombs in the main city of India's troubled northeastern Assam state, police said. The first bomb went off in a heavily populated residential area of Gauhati, police said. Two other devices exploded near a crowded shopping mall and at a street market.

NEW DELHI - The mass exodus from southern cities by thousands of panicked Indians returning to their homes in the country's northeast in recent days has underscored deep social fissures in the country, the power of social media and the peril of weak political leadership, analysts said. Hate messages and threats spread on social media last week after violence against northeasterners, sparking fear among tens of thousands from the region who have moved to major Indian cities in search of jobs and education.

A series of bomb blasts ripped through India's northeastern state of Assam on Thursday, killing at least 76 people and injuring hundreds. At least 13 bombs exploded just before midday in the urban areas of Guwahati, Assam's main city; Bongaigaon; Barpeta and Kokrajhar. Television footage showed firefighters spraying water on burned vehicles as plumes of black smoke rose into the sky and police covered charred bodies with sheets. More than 300 people were injured, some critically. Most of the explosions occurred in busy marketplaces, timed to strike daytime shoppers, and "were apparently aimed at creating fear and public anger," said Sanjoy Hazarika, an analyst with the Center for North East Studies and Policy Research, a think tank in New Delhi.

Reporting from Ladrymbai, India The young miners descend on rickety ladders made of branches into the makeshift coal mines dotting the Jaintia Hills in northeast India, scrambling sideways into "rat hole" shafts so small that even kneeling becomes impossible. Lying horizontally, they hack away with picks and their bare hands: Human labor here is far cheaper than machines. Many wear flip-flops and shorts, their faces and lungs blackened by coal. None have helmets. Two hours of grinding work fills a cart half the size of a coffin that they drag back, crouching, to the mouth where a clerk credits their work.

In the hills of Assam state, the children of tea pickers pluck tea, and farmers' sons become farmers. But since Azaduddin Talukdar's father was a notorious bandit, he became what police call a BC-A1 -- "Bad Character Class A1," the worst category of criminal. He followed admirably in his father's footsteps, earning a good living from thievery, extortion and kidnapping.

Reporting from Ladrymbai, India The young miners descend on rickety ladders made of branches into the makeshift coal mines dotting the Jaintia Hills in northeast India, scrambling sideways into "rat hole" shafts so small that even kneeling becomes impossible. Lying horizontally, they hack away with picks and their bare hands: Human labor here is far cheaper than machines. Many wear flip-flops and shorts, their faces and lungs blackened by coal. None have helmets. Two hours of grinding work fills a cart half the size of a coffin that they drag back, crouching, to the mouth where a clerk credits their work.

Clashes between ethnic groups in India's remote northeast have left at least 49 people dead in four days, officials said. The fighting in Assam state began Friday. Ethnic Bodos and Muslim settlers in Assam have a history of conflict and have fought recently with bows and arrows, spears and machetes, and have burned each other's homes and property, officials said over the weekend. More than 150 people have been injured and more than 100,000 have fled their homes, said Assam Home Commissioner Subhash Das.

As temp jobs go, Saroj Mehli has landed what she feels is a pretty sweet deal. It's a nine-month gig, no special skills needed, and the only real labor comes at the end -- when she gives birth. If everything goes according to plan, Mehli, 32, will deliver a healthy baby early next year. But rather than join her other three children, the newborn will be handed over to an American couple who are unable to bear a child on their own and are hiring Mehli to do it for them.

Parliament's upper house voted to make the isolated Himalayan region of Arunachal Pradesh India's 24th state, although the area--roughly the size of Maine--is the object of a festering border dispute with China. The action will end federal control of the area and allow for the creation of a legislature in the capital of Itanagar, about 1,000 miles east of New Delhi. During British rule, Arunachal Pradesh was known as the North Eastern Frontier Agency and was part of Assam state.

Swirling flood waters of the Brahmaputra River have submerged the homes of more than 2 million people, drowning at least 40 of them in India's remote northeast, officials said. Thirty-five other people have died of encephalitis, dysentery and malaria in Assam state in the past two days, they said. Military helicopters have dropped food, medicine and tents to hundreds of people stranded on rooftops since Thursday.

Four bomb blasts killed eight people in India's troubled northeastern state of Assam, a day before Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's scheduled visit to the region, police said. Authorities blamed the state's main separatist group, the United Liberation Front of Asom. Singh's visit would go ahead, a spokesman said. The first bomb exploded in a crowded parking area in Guwahati, killing seven people, police said. Another person was killed when rebels threw grenades at a police station in Mankachar, near the border with Bangladesh.

A series of bomb blasts ripped through India's northeastern state of Assam on Thursday, killing at least 76 people and injuring hundreds. At least 13 bombs exploded just before midday in the urban areas of Guwahati, Assam's main city; Bongaigaon; Barpeta and Kokrajhar. Television footage showed firefighters spraying water on burned vehicles as plumes of black smoke rose into the sky and police covered charred bodies with sheets. More than 300 people were injured, some critically. Most of the explosions occurred in busy marketplaces, timed to strike daytime shoppers, and "were apparently aimed at creating fear and public anger," said Sanjoy Hazarika, an analyst with the Center for North East Studies and Policy Research, a think tank in New Delhi.

Clashes between ethnic groups in India's remote northeast have left at least 49 people dead in four days, officials said. The fighting in Assam state began Friday. Ethnic Bodos and Muslim settlers in Assam have a history of conflict and have fought recently with bows and arrows, spears and machetes, and have burned each other's homes and property, officials said over the weekend. More than 150 people have been injured and more than 100,000 have fled their homes, said Assam Home Commissioner Subhash Das.

Thousands of migrant laborers in buses, trucks and trains fled northeastern India in the second day of an exodus triggered by separatists who have killed scores of workers. Militants have killed 72 people, most of them Hindi-speaking migrants, in Assam state since Friday, sparking widespread fear in a community that comes to Assam for eight months a year to work at brick kilns.

A second day of bloodshed in Assam state in India's restive northeast left more than 20 people dead, including 13 sleeping migrant workers shot by suspected separatists and eight government employees killed by a land mine, police said. A day earlier, attacks killed 35 migrants and wounded at least 19.

Every week or so, the phone rings in the professor's home, and a voice echoes from a guerrilla hide-out far to the east. The professor, Indira Goswami, is a prominent scholar of the Ramayana, the ancient Hindu epic. She is also the best-known novelist in India's northeastern state of Assam. Her books reverberate with the struggles of India's vast underclass.

NEW DELHI - The mass exodus from southern cities by thousands of panicked Indians returning to their homes in the country's northeast in recent days has underscored deep social fissures in the country, the power of social media and the peril of weak political leadership, analysts said. Hate messages and threats spread on social media last week after violence against northeasterners, sparking fear among tens of thousands from the region who have moved to major Indian cities in search of jobs and education.

Indian Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar has won a political battle to hold elections in troubled Punjab and Assam states in May, the Press Trust of India said Friday.

As temp jobs go, Saroj Mehli has landed what she feels is a pretty sweet deal. It's a nine-month gig, no special skills needed, and the only real labor comes at the end -- when she gives birth. If everything goes according to plan, Mehli, 32, will deliver a healthy baby early next year. But rather than join her other three children, the newborn will be handed over to an American couple who are unable to bear a child on their own and are hiring Mehli to do it for them.