Three-state police meet in Goa over bomb blasts

Sandesh Prabhudesai
10 June 2000  

A joint effort has begun into the bomb blast incidents that took place in the churches of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Goa on Thursday with high officials from the police departments of all the three states meeting here today morning.

"It was just sharing of information and nothing more than that", said Goa DIG Karnal Singh while refusing to divulge any information regarding what transpired at the meeting. He was secretive even about who are down in Goa or for how many days they would be here.

Singh even refused to disclose whether the tripartite talks are aiming towards planning a joint strategy into the investigations as they have found some similarities into the series of bomb blasts that rocked the three states on the same day.

The Goa police however is working on three angles – local involvement, ISI hand or some fundamentalists organisations behind the bomb blast, though they are not prepared to name any particular fundamentalist organisation in this respect.

The only similarity the police have found into the bomb blasts in all the three states is that crude bombs made with Potassium Chlorate were being used for the blast while they were placed on windows in small tins in Karnataka and Goa.

Though the union home ministry has reportedly instructed the states to provide security to all the churches, chief minister Francisco Sardinha said it is not possible as every village in the tiny state has at least one main church and several chapels.

The Bharatiya Janata Party, which is presently sharing power in Sardinha's coalition government, has suspected hand of the ISI into it. "It is a ploy by the anti-national forces to create a Hindu-Catholic communal divide", alleges BJP spokesman Manohar Parrikar.

While strongly refuting the theory, the Congress here has however alleged BJP's hand into it in order to dismantle the Christian minorities in Goa. "It looks like a government-sponsored act", alleges Jitendra Deshprabhu, the Congress spokesman.

As the local police would ultimately play at the hands of those in power, the opposition party has also demanded probe by an independent agency. "Why should the well-organised ISI should use crude bombs rather than RDX etc", he asks.

Deshprabhu has also demanded that the police should directly name whether it is the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal or the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh involved in it instead of simply saying that fundamentalist organisations may be involved.

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