Nine people are dead and 20 injured after a blast in a car near Red Fort on Monday evening, officials said.
The blast took place in a Hyundai i20 car at 6.52 pm near the Red Fort Metro Station, leaving mangled bodies and wrecked cars scattered in the busy area.
“The blast took place in a slow-moving vehicle that came to a halt at the Red Fort traffic signal. There were occupants in the car. The blast damaged cars nearby,” Delhi Police Commissioner Satish Golcha told reporters.
A high alert has been sounded in Delhi. Twenty fire engines were rushed to the spot with police cordoning off the area, the Delhi Fire Services (DFS) said.
The anti-terror squad and Delhi Police Special Cell are on the spot to assess the situation.
Visuals of the incident showed plumes of fire billowing from the burning cars. Panic gripped the area that was swarming with a huge crowd of people.
The blast came hours after Jammu and Kashmir Police recovered nearly 3,000 kg of explosives from two residential buildings in Faridabad in Haryana.
The materials – which included 350kg of ammonium nitrate, a commonly-used fertiliser that can be turned into a deadly bomb – were seized based on intel from arrested J&K-based doctor, Adil Rather.
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