80 dead as seven blasts rock Jaipur

JAIPUR (Agencies) - Seven near-simultaneous bomb blasts tore through crowded markets in the Indian tourist city of Jaipur Tuesday, killing at least 80 people and wounding 150 in what police said was a terror attack.

"We have information that 80 people have died," Rajasthan state home minister Gulab Chand Kataria told reporters.

"One suspect was detained and is being investigated," he added in Jaipur, the state capital.

As per the Indian Home Ministry sources, the blasts occurred at crowded marketplaces of the city including Hawa Mahal, Johri Bazaar, Tripolia where a Hanuman temple drew a large number of devotees, Chandpol, Manas Chowk and Bari Choppad, which are thickly populated areas of Jaipur. The blasts took place between 7:15pm and 7:45pm.

One of the explosions went off near a packed Hindu temple, leaving pools of blood outside in the street and cycles and rickshaws in a mangled heap, television pictures showed.

"We will not tolerate such activities at all," said Vasundhara Raje, chief minister of the desert state.

Among the dead were a 10-year-old boy at the Hanuman (monkey god) temple, a bride in a bright red saree still wearing marriage bangles and a young man covered in blood who was left hanging over the twisted wreckage of a bicycle rickshaw, the Press Trust of India said.

Shopping bags, bloodied sandals and shoes were strewn around Johri Bazaar, one of the hit markets, which security forces cleared quickly for fear of further blasts.

"It's a terror attack," Rajasthan Police Director-General Amarjot Singh Gill told NDTV.