Second blast near Sikh shrine in India in 36 hours

AMRITSAR: A second blast in 36 hours rocked the area around the Sikh holy site of the Golden Temple in India’s Amritsar city on Monday, police said.

Authorities said that there were no casualties or damage reported in the incident, with police investigating the possible cause.

The late Saturday night blast, which police said they were still probing, left at least one person wounded in the northern city in the Sikh-majority Punjab state.

The Golden Temple — a gleaming edifice in a large artificial pond — is revered by Sikhs the world over.

But it has been the scene of violence in the past, most notably when Indian special forces stormed it in 1984 to remove Sikh militants.

Devotees told AFP that officials arrived soon after the early morning blast on Monday — when hundreds of people would have been at the shrine — to collect forensic samples.

“Such happenings are creating panic,” said worshipper Jasbir Singh Patti, who visits the temple daily.

“It is time for the police administration to act swiftly to present the truth before the public.”

Several windows cracked in the blast in the same area on Saturday — when the site can see around 200,000 visitors.

In March, a manhunt was launched in Punjab to arrest a firebrand Sikh separatist that sparked protests and vandalism among the diaspora.

It was unclear if the latest blasts were linked.

Thousands of officers were deployed in the northern state and mobile internet was cut off for days in the effort to locate Amritpal Singh, 30, who was arrested last month.

Singh rose to prominence calling for a separate Sikh homeland known as Khalistan, the struggle for which sparked deadly violence in India in the 1980s and 1990s.