Deadly Bombay Train Blast

A bomb Thursday killed at least 10 people and injured 55 others on a train at a suburban station in Bombay, India's financial hub, officials said.

The bomb exploded on a local train at Bombay's Mulund station as commuters were returning home from work. The dead included eight women and two men, said senior government official Utpal Mukhopadhyay.

Police say Islamic hard-line groups have carried out at least two crude bomb attacks in the past four months in Bombay, which lies on India's western coast. Mukhopadhyay said Thursday's blast was bigger.

Officials said that a security alert was raised at railroad stations across India and sensitive installations in Bombay after the blast.

Mukhopadhyay said the explosion took place between a ladies-only first class coach and a general compartment.

Witnesses said panic swept through passengers at the station and railway traffic on the route was stopped.

"I am in the train car. Part of the roof has been blown off," Kirit Somaiya, a lawmaker of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party who arrived soon after the blast, said by telephone. "It is a horrible sight."

Police cordoned off the area, trying to keep hundreds of curious onlookers from breaking through barricades.

Witnesses said they saw several injured people being taken away in taxis.

Pratiksha Naik, who had gone shopping, said she reached the scene a few minutes after the blast.

"I saw police helping passengers smeared in blood out of the train," Naik said by telephone.

After the earlier blasts in Bombay, security had been tightened in the metropolis and surveillance increased in public places.