Hizbul Mujahideen behind Jammu grenade attack, militant Yasir Bhatt arrested

At least one person has died and 30 others have been injured in a grenade blast that took place at the busy Jammu bus stand on Thursday.

Mohammad Sharik, 17, a resident of Hardiwar in Uttarakhand, who was among the people brought to the hospital, succumbed to splinter injuries in the chest, the officials said.

Jammu and Kashmir DGP Dalbir Singh said the person who threw the grenade has been arrested.

IGP Jammu, Manish K Sinha said the accused has been identified as Yasir Bhatt who was tasked to throw this grenade by District Commander of Hizbul Mujahideen in Kulgam, Farooq Ahmed Bhatt alias Omar.

The condition of four more injured persons was "critical" and two of them were operated upon by the doctors to save their lives, they said.

The injured included 11 residents of Kashmir, two from Bihar and one each from Chattisgarh and Haryana, the officials said.

Of the total injured, 19 have been admitted to the Government Medical College (GMC), Jammu.

Police have cordoned off the area.

This is the third blast around the Jammu bus stand in the past 10 months.

Inspector General of Police, Jammu, M K Sinha said preliminary investigation suggested that someone lobbed the grenade in the bus stand area around noon, causing the explosion.

The scene of the blast along B C Road was sealed off by police and a massive hunt has been launched to nab the grenade thrower, Sinha, who immediately rushed to the scene to take stock of the situation, told reporters.

A parked bus of the state road transport corporation (SRTC) suffered extensive damage in the blast which caused panic among the people.

"Whenever there is heightened state of alert, we strengthen checking and frisking but there is always a possibility of someone slipping through and this one seems to be a case like that," the IGP said.

The officer said there was no specific input about such an attack in the city.

"General inputs are always there and the deployments have been made. We are working on the leads all the time whenever we get inputs but there was nothing specific about this," Sinha said.

"Obviously the intention is always to disturb the communal harmony and peace," he said and requested the people to maintain calm.

The IGP said the police is collecting the evidence and "we are sure to hunt him down (the attacker)."

Immediately after the explosion, people ran to safety and later as the situation returned to normal evacuated the injured to the hospital.

A low-intensity blast had rocked the Jammu bus stand on December 28. A grenade was lobbed at the police station building in the vicinity, police officials had said.

On May 24, 2018, three people had suffered injuries in the grenade attack at the bus stand. The injured included two policemen.

The blast comes at a time when Jammu and Kashmir is on high alert due to heightened tensions between India and Pakistan.