Mumbai: "[I]n the last six years, not a single incident of blast has taken place," Union minister Prakash Javadekar said on March 7, 2020. The claim is false. More than 1,000 explosion incidents were reported in many parts of the country over the last six years, a FactChecker.in analysis of data recorded by the South Asia Terrorism Portal revealed.

"What we had experienced for 10-25 years (before (the) Modi government came to power)? We saw bomb blasts taking place in Pune, Vadodara, Ahmednagar, Delhi and Mumbai. Every eight to ten days, blasts used to happen and people used to get killed," Javadekar was quoted as saying in a Press Trust of India report published in The Hindu. "But in the last six years, not a single incident of blast has taken place. This has not happened just like that but due to some strong measures undertaken by the PM to ensure the safety and security in the country."

As many as 1,071 explosion incidents have been reported between January 2014, and March 8, 2020, in India, according to data from South Asia Terrorism Portal, a website that records and maintains database on terrorism and low intensity warfare in South Asia.

Four explosions were reported in Assam on January 26, 2020, with no casualties. The explosions were carried out using grenades and time-induced improvised explosive devices. The state's chief minister condemned the blast, promising "sternest action" to book the culprits.




A low intensity blast was reported at Hubballi railway station in Karnataka on October 21, 2019, a government reply to Lok Sabha on November 20, 2019, said.

Last year, a grenade attack near Central Mall on Zoo road in Guwahati, on May 15, 2019, had injured six people.



Three security force personnel and 15 people were injured in a grenade attack at Hari Singh High Street market in Jammu and Kashmir on November 4, 2019. Earlier, on October 12, 2019, terrorists had hurled a grenade in which five civilians were injured.




Other bombing incidents reported in the country:

As many as 40 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) soldiers lost their lives in a terror attack caused by a blast in Pulwama on February 14, 2019. "A bus in which 42 CRPF personnel were travelling, was extensively damaged in a blast which was followed by firing on the vehicles," ANI reported on February 14, 2019.

On March 7, 2017, a blast took place on the Bhopal Ujjain passenger train in Madhya Pradesh, in which 11 passengers were injured, government told the Lok Sabha in a reply on March 29, 2017.

A low intensity blast was reported in a district court premises Chittor on April 7, 2016, and an improvised explosive device exploded on September 12, 2016, government infomed the Lok Sabha on November 22, 2016.

A bomb blast was reported on January 23, 2015, in the premises of Civil Court Bhojpur (Ara) in Bihar, government reply to Lok Sabha on March 17, 2015, said. Two persons including the woman who was carrying the bomb were killed and 18 people were injured, the reply said. The blast was made in an attempt to facilitate two prisoners to escape from prison.

An explosion took place on October 2, 2014, in a two-story building in West Bengal's Burdwan, in which two people were killed and one was injured, government informed Lok Sabha in November 2014. It was found that these individuals and those present in the house were believed to be members of Jamat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), and were engaged in preparation of bombs and ammunition/arms.

A low intensity blast occurred in Bengaluru's Church Street on December 28, 2014, in which one person was killed and three injured, the government said in a reply to the Lok Sabha on May 5, 2015.

In India, 406 blast incidents (337 improvised explosive devices and 69 explosive ordnance) took place in 2016, a government reply to Lok Sabha on April 11, 2017, said. The National Security Guard's National Bomb Data Centre (NBDC) "data includes all major as well as minor IED blast incidents in the country, including those which are accidental in nature", the reply said.

Likewise, in 2015, there were 268 IED blasts, and in 2014, 190, The Economic Times reported on July 12, 2018, citing data from NBDC's journal Bombshell.

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Factchecker Team