Indian PM vows to hunt those behind terror blasts

Mumbai: India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Thursday vowed that those responsible for a series of bomb blasts that killed 18 people in Mumbai would be tracked down and prosecuted, as he visited the injured.

"Perpetrators of [the] Mumbai blasts shall be pursued relentlessly and brought to justice quickly," the premier said on a tour of city hospitals treating some of the more than 130 wounded in Wednesday's blasts.

Investigators are banking on security camera footage to pinpoint who was behind the explosions, which happened within 15 minutes in two crowded commercial areas of south Mumbai and a central residential district. Police said that the bombs were made of ammonium nitrate — an ingredient for fertiliser.

Vigilance urged

Earlier in the day, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram said in Mumbai that any terror group which is hostile to India could be behind the attack and there should be no finger-pointing at any organisation at this stage.

With no arrests made so far and no organisation claiming responsibility for the attacks, all terror groups, including foreign ones and Maoists against whom the Maharashtra government had taken action by arresting some of its cadres in April, were under the scanner.

He said the central and state agencies are working closely to ascertain "whether the blasts are in retaliation for action taken or caused by other groups." The state had also arrested last week two operatives of the Indian Mujahideen, the initial suspect in the blasts.

Investigators are not ruling out anyone, he said, but emphasised: "We live in the most troubled neighbourhood. Pakistan is the epicentre of terror in the world."

Speaking at a press conference at Sahyadri guest house in Mumbai, he said, not just the financial capital of India but every city in the country is vulnerable to terror and therefore "we have to be eternally vigilant." Chidambaram, however, denied there was any intelligence failure.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan said the government will give a compensation of Rs500,000 (Dh40,856) to families of the deceased and Rs50,000 to those injured in Wednesday's triple blasts.