SRINAGAR, Feb 10 (1990) – A series of bomb blasts rocked Kashmir’s Himalayan valley on Saturday, the eve of an emotive anniversary for Moslem militants battling Indian rule.
Police sources and witnesses reported 17 bombings, most of them in Srinagar, summer capital of the state where militants are demanding independence or secession to neighbouring Pakistan.
But an official spokesman reported only five bomb attacks, including one in Srinagar on a Reserve Bank of India building which stands opposite the Jammu and Kashmir state police headquarters. There were no reports of casualties in the blasts.
At least 85 people have died in a three-week-old revolt in Indian-ruled Kashmir, creating a crisis between India and Pakistan.
Earlier on Saturday both countries said they did not want a third war over Kashmir. They have fought over the territory twice since independence from Britain in 1947.
Sunday is the sixth anniversary of the hanging of Maqbool Butt, a leader of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) which has spearheaded the separatist campaign.
Militants urged Kashmiris to observe a “black day” on Sunday — an order which usually means staying indoors without lights.
An official spokesman said the Indian army had been put on standby and patrols intensified at key points.
Butt, sentenced to death in 1976 for the killing of an Indian intelligence officer in Kashmir, was hanged in 1984 after another Kashmiri militant group kidnapped and killed an Indian diplomat in the English city of Birmingham.
Butt’s release had been one of the kidnappers’ demands.
