14 bombs recovered in Chhattisgarh

Raipur, Dec 27 (IANS) Fourteen live bombs were recovered Saturday at two places on the outskirts of this Chhattisgarh capital, a senior police officer said.

'We have seized 14 live bombs from two points. They were transported from an iron ore laden goods train to a steel plant here from neighbouring Orissa,' Girdhari Nayak, state's additional director general of police, told IANS.

'These bombs are 105-mm in size and experts from the ordnance factory in Jabalpur in Madhya Pradesh have been called to examine and defuse them,' the police officer said.

Twelve bombs kept in six boxes were recovered while unloading iron ore at the steel plant of Monnet Ispat and Energy Ltd, some 20 km from here, and two bombs were seized from the Mandhar railway station near Raipur.

'We are working on all the leads and it would be too early to conclude whether there is a Maoist or terrorist link to the incident,' Y.K.S. Thakur, inspector general of police (Raipur range), told reporters.

The police kept the bombs at an isolated location and cordonned off the area.