Opera House footage provides no breakthrough

Mumbai: Investigators have reportedly made very little progress on shortlisting who may have been responsible for the Mumbai serial blasts on Wednesday.

17 people were killed and 131 injured in the blasts which took place within minutes of each other at Zaveri Bazaar, Opera House and Dadar. Footage from security cameras at all three locations is being scrutinised.

Till last evening, sources said they were focusing on three men seen speaking on their phones for over an hour at Opera House, a hub for diamond traders. (Read: Cops scouring 46 CCTV cameras for clues)

However, Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan cautioned this morning that "diamond traders... or in any trading in Mumbai...so much of it is done on the phone." (Watch Full Interview) He said it would be "far-fetched" to suppose these men were "providing a running commentary" on the terror attack. Union Home Secretary RK Singh said that the focus will be on "identifying men who are not locals."

Mr Singh said the scooter on which a bomb was planted at Zaveri Bazaar has been identified. NDTV tracked down the house of Bhagchand Jain - the scooter owner. (Watch: The scooter on which the bomb was placed)

When NDTV spoke to Mr Jain's mother, she said they saw the scooter on television and were able to identify it. She then added, that 'their employee used to take the Activa everyday to the shop.'

They own a mobile shop in Zaveri Bazaar. The mother refuses to say whether the police have questioned her son, but sources say the owner was questioned today but did not emerge as a suspect; he seemed to have no links to any suspect groups.

What is known so far is that the Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) used were powered by a deadly mixture of ammonium nitrate, Tri-Nitro Toluene (TNT) and fuel oil. They were triggered, most likely, by cellphones. Two of the bombs used more than a kilo each of explosives.

A severed head had been one of the most unsettling parts of the information that emerged in the aftermath of the blasts. After speculation over whether the victim may have been a human bomb, he was identified this morning at a hospital morgue as a labourer who died at Zaveri Bazaar.

Another corpse embedded with an electrical circuit had also provoked questions about a suicide bomber. The body was found by doctors at JJ Hospital where victims of the blasts were being rushed in. "It is not logical to have an electronic timer and a suicide bomber. But we are looking at it very carefully. Maybe the body was too close to the impact of the explosion. I would not like to speculate too much on this. Home Minister is looking closely at all this," the Chief Minister told NDTV. "No route, no theory should be ruled out. I have told the police to look even at remotest possibility," he said.

Intelligence sources say that they are continuing to explore whether the blasts may have been carried out by members of sleeper cells of the Indian Mujahideen. Investigators say the group that executed the blasts was small and did not communicate on phones or emails - a new strategy to avoid being tracked. When asked about this, Mr Chavan said, "Trying to point a finger at one particular group may not be right because then we stop looking at other groups." (In Pics: Terror revisits Mumbai)

The Home Minister and Mr Chavan have both accepted that there was no intelligence alert for the blasts. But Mr Chavan said it would be "harsh" to equate this with an intelligence failure. "The possibility of generating intelligence is tough in an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) where only one-two people are involved. Nobody was tipped off; it was a simple kind of operation. May be very few people were involved. Specific actionable information is not possible for an operation like this," he said.

HINTS OF INDIAN MUJAHIDEEN BUT WITH LARGE GAPS

The use of IEDs has many experts looking for a possible Indian Mujahideen (IM) involvement. The IEDs are their signature explosives. But what fuels the theory is that this blast almost coincides with the fifth anniversary of the 2006 Mumbai train blasts, now linked to the terror group. (Watch: Indian Mujahideen sleeper cells may have been activated: Sources)

Sources also tell NDTV that remnants of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and fringe elements of IM are under the scanner.

Investigators are in touch with the Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka Police - hubs of these groups.

However, preliminary evidence has also raised some questions on the IM's involvement - the most important being the fact that none of the bombs were expertly planted to maximise impact. In Zaveri Bazaar, the bomb was wrapped in an umbrella and kept face-up on a scooter. The result: Though the blast was the most intense of the three, the impact was felt upwards and not on the ground. In Dadar, the bomb was placed on a transformer box next to a tree that bore the maximum brunt.