13 injured in Bangalore blast
Bangalore, April 17, 2013
Thirteen people, including eight policemen, have been injured in an explosion near the office of a political party in the southern Indian city of Bangalore, police were quoted as saying.
Police said the blast could have originated from a motorcycle parked near an office of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP ) office in the Malleshwaram area of Bangalore, a BBC report said.
It took place weeks ahead of key elections in Karnataka state.
The BJP runs the government of the state of Karnataka, of which Bangalore is the capital.
TV pictures showed a few destroyed vehicles at the site of the explosion.
Eyewitnesses said it was a "big explosion which shook some nearby buildings".
Bangalore police chief Raghavendra Auradkar told reporters that the injured had been taken to a hospital, where two people were in a serious condition.
"It was definitely a explosion. What kind of explosion I can't say at this stage. We initially thought it was a gas cylinder explosion. [Now] we believe it is a motorcycle blast - a motorcycle [has been] destroyed," he said.
A spokesman of the BJP said he heard a "huge sound" when he was working in the party office.
"We found two or three vehicles on fire. Some people were lying on the ground injured. We thought it was a gas cylinder explosion," S Prakash told the NDTV news channel.
Seventeen people died and more than 100 people were injured in twin explosions in the Indian city of Hyderabad in February.
