Cops make city ‘immobile’

Cops make city ‘immobile’
BY R. JAYAPRAKASH
BENGALURU


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The city police swung into action immediately after a series of low intensity blasts on Hosur Road on Friday afternoon, by shutting down mobile networks along Madivala, Adugodi, Koramangala and BTM Layout fearing further blasts may be detonated using mobile phones.

Immediately after the blast at around 1.20 pm that killed a woman and injured three others at the Madivala bus stand, three other blasts followed: One, opposite Madivala police station, another near National Dairy Development Board and the third near Hercules sports shop. Almost instantly, mobile service providers, including Airtel, Tata Indicom, Vodaphone, BSNL, Reliance and Spice were asked to turn off their towers here to prevent any other possible blasts. Police sources told Deccan Chronicle that this had been the modus operandi of many terror outfits, who were responsible for the blasts in Hyderabad, Mumbai and Jaipur, among other cities over the last year. They pointed out that iinvestigations had proved that blasts in Ajmer Sharif, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Gulmarg had been triggered using mobile phones as detonators.

“It was the series of blasts that prompted us to take this step. The service providers obliged and within minutes around 35 towers went off in Madivala and surrounding areas in a radius of around 12 km,” sources said. Airtel and BSNL, confirmed this.

“The home department asked us to shut down the towers that receive and send signals from the satellites in response to the situation. So between 2 pm and 4.30 pm our towers were turned off,” said Airtel.

Panic stricken residents and commuters made frantic attempts to reach loved ones until it cane back 4.30 pm.