HUGE BOMB blast in Bombay (Mumbai)!!!

Phone call from India ^ | Aug 25 2003 | Me

[USMMA_83]

http://www.grant.org/plewins/india2000/Delhi/Mumbai.jpg

[SauronOfMordor]

I'm sorry. Yes the Babri Masjid was demolished in Dec 1992, leading to rioting and bombing in 1993 and onward:

The Ramjanmabhumi Temple mobilization appeared to pay substantial dividends in terms of the BJP's remarkable growth of support in North India in the 1991 elections, and the VHP and BJP kept the issue alive despite the fact that their actions put tremendous pressure on the newly elected BJP state government in Uttar Pradesh. Its July 1992 kar sewa (mass mobilization force work service) to build the temple ended peacefully only through last-minute negotiations with Prime Minister Rao; Rao had been promised by BJP leader L.K. Advani that the December 6, 1992, kar sewa would also be peaceful. Despite Advani's promise, thousands of Hindu activists broke through a police cordon and destroyed the Babri Masjid (see Public Worship, ch. 3). This event and the subsequent riots throughout the country left no doubt that tensions between Hindus and Muslims had reached a high pitch.

During the following week, riots spread throughout the countryside, killing some 1,700 people. Riots broke out again in Bombay from January 9 through January 11, killing 500 more people. In March 1993, the Bombay Stock Exchange and other prominent places in the city were shaken, and some 200 people were killed by bombs that the central government alleges were placed by members of India's criminal underworld at the behest of Pakistan's intelligence service. The manipulation of India's religious tensions by militants, criminals, and politicians highlighted the extent to which religious sentiments in India had become an object of exploitation. Religious tensions eased somewhat and incidents of communal violence declined during the remainder of 1993 and through 1994, but the persistence of the social conditions that gave birth to violence and the continued opportunism of India's politicians suggest that the relative peace may be only an interlude...

[A Simple Soldier]

Jakarta.

[visualops]

Bombs Kill at Least 40 in Bombay, Wound Scores
Mon August 25, 2003 06:00 AM ET
BOMBAY, India (Reuters) - Bombs exploded in India's financial capital Bombay on Monday, killing at least 40 people and wounding scores, some seriously, police said.
It was not immediately clear who planted the bombs, one of which exploded near the historic Gateway of India, a crowded monument in the tourist heart of the city.

The blasts follow a thaw in relations between Pakistan and India, which has accused its neighbor in the past of harboring Islamic radicals it blames for previous attacks on its territory.

Police official S.K. Tonapi told Reuters 40 people had been killed and at least 125 wounded.

"Everyone over here is pretty shaken," said an employee of the luxury Taj Mahal Hotel, which stands beside the brown sandstone arch that is the Gateway of India.

"At least four or five people were injured -- their legs and hands bleeding. Two or three guys were unconscious. They were all mainly street peddlers," the employee, who declined to be named, told Reuters.

"There are remnants of a taxi lying around, such as the front of the taxi and the tires, right in front of the old Taj."

The key Bombay Stock Exchange index fell over 3 percent on the news, while the National Stock Exchange index fell more than 3.5 percent.

The rupee also weakened to 45.8850/9050 to the dollar from 45.8450/8550.

A state home ministry official told Reuters there had been four blasts around the city, but could not confirm that all were bombs.

Police said there were at least two bombs, one of which was near the Gateway of India, the other near a Hindu temple.

Last year, nuclear-armed India and Pakistan had one million troops staring at each other across their border in the disputed Kashmir region, and relations were frozen.

That standoff followed a bloody December 2001 attack by Islamic radicals on India's federal parliament in New Delhi.

Mainly Hindu India blamed the parliament attack on Pakistan-based militants fighting for independence in Indian-ruled Kashmir, its only Muslim-majority state.

SIGNS OF A THAW

Signs of a thaw emerged in April when Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said he wanted to make a final personal bid for peace with Pakistan.

Confidence-building measures such as the restoration of a suspended bus link between Pakistan and India in July bred goodwill across the subcontinent.

Talks on restoring air links had been planned for this week.

But a constant refrain from India has been that Pakistan has to do more to curb Muslim radicals launching cross-border raids into Kashmir.

Bombay has been hit by a series of deadly bomb attacks in recent months.

The attacks revived grim memories among Bombay residents of a wave of blasts in the city in March 1993 that killed 250.

Those blasts, in 13 places within 90 minutes of each other, were blamed on groups avenging Muslim deaths in Hindu-Muslim riots following the razing of a mosque at Ayodhya in northern India.

"The front windows of the downstairs restaurants of the Taj are shattered and some of the rooms on top, too -- all shattered," the hotel employee said of the latest blast.

Speedboats and yachts often cluster in the waters of the bay across the street from the Taj, but authorities have warned the vessels to stay away, the employee added.

"Authorities have sent all those cruising yachts out to sea and they're sending signal flares to all the big ships not to come into the bay," she said.

In December a bomb blew off the rear of a bus, killing three people in Bombay and wounding 26.

In March, a bomb blew apart a packed rush-hour train killing 12 people and wounding 75.

In July, a bomb ripped through a Bombay bus, killing two people and injuring 42.

[risk]

I don't work for State. :-)

Well, I'm in total admiration for anyone working for the state department in the foreign service, etc... It's their leadership that seems to be a tad Machiavellian (when we have the power to just do the right thing) and elitist (assuming that our political power is everlasting and can be frittered away)

[USMMA_83]

Dang it...can someone show me how you display an image on FR?

[SauronOfMordor]

can someone show me how you display an image on FR?

Insert following html:

< img src="insert url of image here" >

[Samwise]

[visualops]

If you are linking to a picture on another website, enclose the following in brackets < > :
IMG SRC="web address"

To get the address, right click the image, select properties, highlight the entire address(URL), press CTRL+C. The, paste that between the quote marks.

[USMMA_83]

Thanks Sam!

[visualops]

The=Then

[A Simple Soldier]

How do I post a digital photo? I took it from my window an hour ago of the actual taxi remains.

I have it on my hard drive now.

[tictoc]

You need to upload the image to a server. Linking from your computer's harddrive to FR directly is not possible unless you have a server running on your computer (99% of users don't).

[A Simple Soldier]

What is a good server to upload to?

[tictoc]

I'm sorry, I don't know. But some knowledgeable Freeper will pipe up very soon.

[dandelion]

A lovely and universal Hindu prayer is found here. May God bring comfort to those who need it now...

[ovrtaxt]

Search for a photo hosting service. Whatever you do, don't use webshots. If you find a good one, let the rest of us know. try pnavy.com , photos.thedieselstop.com or villagephotos.com . there are many more...