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Mumbai bomb suspects in court
NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- Three suspects have appeared in a Mumbai court to face charges under India's strict anti-terrorism laws in connection with last week's deadly twin car bombings, and police were were looking for more suspects, the city's police commissioner has said. A fourth suspect, identified as Syed Mohammed Hanif Rahim, was hospitalized with high blood pressure and will appear in court at a later date, Commissioner R.S. Sharma told reporters Monday. The August 25 bombings in Mumbai killed 52 people and wounded more than 150 others. Sharma said that Arshad Mohammed Hanif Ansari, Rahim and his wife Famida and daughter Farheen were part of a group police believe was established in response to riots last year in Gujarat state that left hundreds dead. That group, police said, has ties to the Kashmiri separatist group Lashkar-e-Taiba. The two women have also been charged in a July 28 attack on a Mumbai city bus. Police said a search of the quartet's homes had turned up 235 gelatin sticks -- high-intensity explosives slightly larger than cigars -- along with 22 detonators and other equipment. Sharma said investigators believe the bombings could not have been carried out solely by the four suspects in custody and were seeking others who may have been involved. Police also believe the suspects and others may have received training in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, he said. Police said the four were part of the Gujarat Revenge group, formed last year after the deadly religious-based riots, which had been triggered by an arson attack on February 27 last year on a train near the town of Godhra in which 59 Hindus died. The incident, thought to have been carried out by a Muslim gang targeting a train carrying Hindu activists, sparked a series of retaliatory attacks on Muslim communities across Gujarat, particularly in the state's commercial capital, Ahmedabad. Human-rights groups estimate more than 3,000 people died in three months of fighting; the official death toll is 1,200. Under the country's Prevention of Terrorism Act, any conviction in last week's bombings could result in the death sentence, although it was unknown if prosecutors would seek the penalty. Both bombs were inside the trunks of taxi cabs, police said. One of the bombs blew up near the colonial-era Gateway to India monument. The second bomb erupted near a major Hindu temple in the city, known until recently as Bombay. At the time of the attacks, Indian Internal Security Minister L.K. Advani said the blasts had the hallmarks Lashkar-e-Taiba and the banned Students Islamic Movement of India. India shut down the Students Islamic Movement of India on September 28, 2001, shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, accusing it of being linked to the al Qaeda terrorist network. Indian authorities padlocked the group's offices and took its leaders into custody. Mumbai is a city of more than 10 million people with a large Muslim population. In recent months, Mumbai, India's financial and film capital, has suffered a string of explosions blamed on Muslim militants. Local Hindu and Muslim leaders both have condemned the bombings and called for calm. The announcement of the charges Monday came after police in the disputed territory of Kashmir said they had killed two members of an alleged terrorist group, including the man suspected of masterminding the attack on India's parliament on December 13, 2001. Ghazi Baba, the commander-in-chief of Jaish-e-Mohammed, or the Army of Muhammad, was killed in a shootout Saturday in the Noor Bagh neighborhood of Srinagar -- the state's summer capital. (Full story) Police Joint Commissioner Niraj Kumar said the militants were part of a plot to target "something spectacular." -- CNN Correspondent Ram Ramgopal contributed to this report.
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