Fifteen wounded in Assam attack

By Subir Bhaumik
BBC News, Calcutta

Fifteen people have been injured in an explosion in India's north-eastern city of Guwahati, police said.

Two policemen were among the injured after a bomb exploded near the railway station in the city, capital of the restive Assam state, on Sunday evening.

In a separate incident, rebels lobbed grenades on an Indian army camp in Sibsagar in northern Assam.

Police said they suspected the rebel separatist group, the United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa) for both attacks.

Ulfa has neither claimed nor denied a role in these two attacks.

The police said the Ulfa is the only group capable of organising such coordinated violent action at different locations simultaneously.

Reverses

This group has been quiet for a while after suffering a string of reverses during police and military operations in the last three months.

A number of its top leaders and activists have been arrested or killed in encounter or have surrendered to the authorities.

Ulfa began an armed rebellion against what it describes as colonial rule by Delhi in 1979. Thousands of people have died in the violence.

An effort to start peace talks between the rebels and the Indian government broke down in 2006.

The rebels are seeking a separate homeland for the Assamese people and demanding the departure of the non-indigenous population, particularly Hindi speakers.