An al-Qaeda-linked group claimed responsibility, though government officials said it was too early to name a suspect. The attack outside the High Court came despite a high alert across the city and renewed doubts about India's ability to protect even its most important institutions despite overhauling security after the 2008 Mumbai siege.
“Have we become so vulnerable that terrorist groups can almost strike at will?” opposition lawmaker Arun Jaitley asked in Parliament.
The bomb left a deep crater on the road and shook the courthouse, sending lawyers and judges fleeing outside.
“There was smoke everywhere. People were running. People were shouting. There was blood everywhere. It was very, very scary,” said lawyer Sangeeta Sondhi, who was parking her car near the gate when the bomb exploded.
The government rallied Indians to remain strong in the face of such attacks.
“We will never succumb to the pressure of terrorists,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said during a visit to neighbouring Bangladesh. “This is a long war in which all political parties and all the people of India will have to stand united so that this scourge of terrorism is crushed.”
The bomb exploded about 10:14 a.m. near a line of more than 100 people waiting at a reception counter for passes to enter the court building to have their cases heard. The blast killed 11 people and wounded 76 others. Their identities were not available, but no judges were among the victims.
People ran to assist the injured, piling them into three-wheeled taxis to take them to the hospital. Ambulances and forensic teams rushed to the scene, along with sniffer dogs and a bomb disposal unit, apparently checking for any further explosives.
The blast probe was quickly turned over to the National Investigation Agency, established after the Mumbai siege to investigate and prevent terror attacks.
Police were scouring the city for possible suspects, searching hotels, bus stands, railway stations and the airport, said top security official U.K. Bansal. All roads out of the city were under surveillance as well, he said.
Late Wednesday, police also released two sketches they said were based on descriptions given by eyewitnesses who claimed they had seen someone with a briefcase waiting in line outside the building.
“We are determined to track down the perpetrators of this horrific crime and bring them to justice,” Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram told Parliament.
An e-mail sent to several TV news channels claimed the bombing on behalf of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami, an extremist group said to be based in Pakistan. The group has been blamed for numerous terror strikes in India, and the U.S. State Department says it has deep ties to al-Qaeda and some members have trained at al-Qaeda camps.
The e-mail demanded the immediate repeal of the death sentence handed to Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri man convicted in the 2001 attack on India's Parliament, and threatened to target other courts, including the Supreme Court.
The court bombing was India's first major attack since a trio of blasts in Mumbai killed 26 people on July 13. Suspicion fell on the shadowy Indian Mujahedeen, though no one has been arrested.
The bomb struck the High Court, an appeals panel below India's Supreme Court, even though the capital is on high alert because Parliament is in session. A small explosion on May 25 in a court parking lot appeared to have been a failed car bomb.
New Delhi: A fresh round of intensive combing of the blast site outside the Delhi High Court began on Thursday early morning. From tree-tops to roadside crevices the search began earnestly. By afternoon the National Investigation Agency (NIA) ran into conflicting dead-end with a santro which was found not connected with the blast probe.
Elsewhere, investigation teams were investigating other elements of the case, from tracing the email sent, tracking phone records and rounding up suspects.
Meanwhile, the death toll in Wednesday's blast has gone up to 13 after another patient, who was admitted in the ICU of the Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, succumbed to his injuries on Thursday evening.
A Rs five lakh reward has been announced for information on the possible bombers by the NIA.
AP Photo/Manish Swarup
Earlier on Thursday, another man died at a hospital, while the condition of some of the victims continued to be critical. Pramod Kumar (40), a resident of west Delhi's Hari Nagar, breathed his last at the Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital on Thursday morning, hospital and police officials said.
The investigators also managed to identify a cyber-cafe in Kishtwar near Jammu from where the email claiming responsibility by Harkat-ul-Jehadi Islami (HuJI) was allegedly sent. Its owner and three others were detained for questioning and though investigators say they are probing both mails, they may well be red herrings.
The interrogation of the cyber café owner and three others has revealed that a youngster could have sent the mail as Afzal Guru's case is an emotive issue in the region. Police are now looking for this youngster.
The UP Police detained a person in Balrampur later on Thursday as he allegedly resembled one of the sketches released by Delhi Police on Wednesday. The fifth person, who has been detained in Balrampur in Uttar Pradesh, has been identified as Shahzad. Police are verifying his identity through his relatives and village sarpanch. Shahzad reportedly works in a factory in Pune.
A Rs 5-lakh reward has been announced for information on the possible bombers by the NIA even as an inter state meeting scheduled for Friday is likely to widen the scope of investigations further.
Even as the investigators are still looking for clues in the Delhi High Court blast case, another email claiming that Wednesday's terror strike was carried out by the Indian Mujahideen has surfaced. The email has been reportedly sent by an Indian Mujahideen operative even as five people, including four in Jammu and Kashmir's Kishtwar and one in Uttar Pradesh, have been detained. It has also warned that the next terror strike would take place at a shopping complex.
UK Bansal, Secretary (Internal Security) in the Ministry of Home Affairs, said that Anti-Terror Squads of neighbouring states are also helping in the investigations. Bansal said that forensic experts have been called in from other states and are helping the NIA.
He said that the email sent reportedly by the Indian Mujahideen cannot be ignored and the investigators will probe it.
Union Home Minister P Chidambaram chaired a meeting of the chiefs of the Research and Analysis Wing, Intelligence Bureau and NIA on Thursday morning to review the security situation.
Delhi Chief Minister Shiela Dikshit on Thursday said politicisation of terror is a problem. "When attacking the integrity of a nation is concerned politics should be kept behind," said Dikshit.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Thursday expressed 'sorrow' and 'anguish' over the Delhi High Court blast. Sonia, who returned on Thursday morning from London after undergoing surgery for an undisclosed ailment in US, expressed her condolence to the affected families.
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