There is more than passing similarity between the serial blasts of Jaipur and Hyderabad. Both the cities were rocked by the bomb blasts in the months of May. It is intriguing that the terrorists chose to target Jaipur exactly a year after they had attacked Hyderabad. It was on May 18 last year that a bomb blast in historic Mecca Masjid in heart of Hyderabad had claimed nine lives and the city was planning to observe the first anniversary of black day later this week when Jaipur's blast came as a thunderbolt. The police and the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) have not been able to solve the mystery of the blasts. After initial theories and claims of organizations like HUJI, Lashkar and Jaish being responsible for the blast, the investigators could not establish exactly who had triggered the bomb and why. Even though about 30 local youth were arrested by the police and some of them are still in jails, no case was booked against them in connection with the blasts. They were booked in other older cases including a conspiracy case but their links with the bomb blasts could not be established. The blast in Mecca Masjid was followed by two more deadly blasts on August 25 at Lumbini Park and Gokul Chat in Kothi in which about 40 people died. They also remained unsolved cases with police making no progress in identifying the culprits. The state Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy and top police officials only said that some foreign hands were involved in the incidents and it will take time to bring them to the book. Another important similarity between the incidents in Hyderabad and Japir is the use of same explosives - ammonium nitrate and a timer to trigger the blast. In both the explosive devices iron balls were used to cause the maximum damage. According to the sources in the state intelligence, the officials here had established contacts with their counterparts in Rajasthan to get information to see whether there was any link between the incidents in the two cities and whether the same organizations were involved in them. __
