An official of India's National Investigation Agency searches for evidence in the debris at one of the two bomb blast sites, in Hyderabad, India, on Friday.
NEW DELHI — The death toll from Thursday’s explosions in Hyderabad, India, rose Friday to 15 people, as new information about India’s deadliest bombing since 2011 suggested the attacks had been long planned, raising questions about whether they could have been prevented.
Two days before the blasts, national intelligence sources warned that there might be terrorist activity in Hyderabad and other Indian cities including Bangalore and Coimbatore, the Home Ministry reported on Friday.
The blasts within about 150 yards of each other near a crowded bus stop in the neighborhood of Dilsukh Nagar, an area packed with shops, restaurants, theaters and a huge produce market.
An Oct. 26, 2012, Delhi Police news release about the arrest of four people in connection with explosions in Pune two months earlier mentioned the Hyderabad neighborhood as a potential target. It said one of the militants arrested in the 2012 case, Imran Khan, had done reconnaissance of the Hyderabad neighborhood “on a motorcycle” with an accomplice.
The news release tied the 2012 attack to Riyaz Bhatkal, the alleged leader of an Islamic radical group called the Indian Mujahedeen.
Hyderabad itself has a fairly vibrant and somewhat radicalized Muslim community. The city was the target of twin bombings in 2007 that took the lives of 25 people, an attack that officials later tied to a terror group based in Bangladesh.
While officials had some indications before Thursday’s bombings that an attack was looming, intelligence experts cautioned that it is not always easy to prevent such attacks.
"These alerts are so routine that you cannot act upon these," said J. N. Rai, a former of India’s Intelligence Bureau, in a telephone interview. "With the use of technology and online communication, it has become rather more difficult" to detect and prevent planned attacks, he added.
Hyderabad, with a population of more than 6 million, is one of India’s most prosperous and fastest-growing cities, home to many software and biotechnology companies.
In the wake of Thursday’s attacks, residents of the city planned demonstrations for Sunday in which they planned to block roads, including the main highway to Bangalore.
Heather Timmons reported from New Delhi, and Gerry Mullany reported from Hong Kong.
