L K Advani escapes bomb attack in Madurai

Madurai: Senior BJP leader L K Advani escaped an alleged attempt on his life in Madurai on Friday. A crude pipe bomb stuffed with gelatine sticks was found planted under a bridge across Gownda river at Alampatti village, near Thirumangalam, in Madurai district hours before Advani’s Jan Chetna Yatra was scheduled to travel along that route.
A villager spotted the wire connected to the bomb and informed the elders, who alerted the police.Senior police officers rushed to the spot, removed the bomb and defused it.
“It is too early to arrive at any conclusion or name suspects. Investigations are on,” said DSP K S Ravichandran. No arrests have been made so far. An officer said, “We had no intelligence alert about any possible threat to Advani in the Madurai region.”
Advani was alerted about the incident, but he left Madurai around 10.30am and continued the yatra by taking an alternative route to Srivilliputhur, from where he left for Thiruvananthapuram via Tenkasi.
The police said the six-feet-long pipe bomb was made of poly vinyl chloride (PVC), stuffed with explosives and connected with wires to a 12 volt battery in a field about 200 metres away. M Selvaraj (49), a villager, spotted the wire around 6am when he went to answer nature’s call and immediately alerted the elders.
On getting information, the bomb disposal squad rushed to the spot and removed the explosive. It was taken to a nearby forest area and defused. “The pipe contained 7kg of high explosive gelatine gel,” a police officer said.