A low-intensity explosion took place at Kerala’s Malappuram District Collectorate on Tuesday triggering panic. The blast took place at 12:45pm.
Police and bomb squads were rushed to the spot where the explosion took place below a parked vehicle. The police officers at the spot said the explosion was kept in a tiffin box under the fuel tank of the car. The tiffin box reportedly contained ammonium nitrate and gun powder.
The car, bearing the number plate KL 10 AQ 597, was hired by District Medical Officer (Homoeo) Reji Kuzhiyellil and was unoccupied at the time of the blast.
“I was thrown out of my chair in my office,” The Hindu quoted District Medical Officer V. Ummer Farook as saying, whose office is in the same complex.
News reports suggest that police have recovered a box containing a pen drive and a pamphlet claiming that the blast was carried by the Base Movement.
A letter along with the photograph of former leader of the Al-Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden was also recovered. The typewritten letter affixed with a map of India says, “On September 28, Mohammed Akhlaq was killed by terrorist of India for eating beef”. The letter concludes stating, “count your days”.
A similar explosion occurred in June at the Kollam Collectorate which was also attributed to the same group.
Base movement is a mysterious organisation under investigation for three blasts at court complexes in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Kerala. In the previous cases, a letter was sent to Chief Secretariat with the same map of India affixed with a picture of Osama used. In January 2006, a similar letter was sent to the French Consulate in Bengaluru. The third letter was sent to the Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes in Andhra’s Chittoor.
An Indian Express report in August 2016 had said that investigators believe proscribed Tamil Nadu terror outfit Al Ummah and Indian wing of the Al Qaeda had realigned itself as the Base Movement.
In August 2014, Al Qaeda leader Ayman Al Zawahiri had announced the launch of Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) or "Jamaat Qaidat al-jihad fi’shibhi al-qarrat al-Hindiya".
Kerala state DGP Lokanath Behera has said that a special investigation team has been constituted to look into the blast.