At least nine dead and 32 injured in explosion at police station in Indian-administered Kashmir; Officials rule out foul play.

A cache of confiscated explosives detonated inside a police station in Indian-administered Kashmir, killing at least nine people and wounding 32 others, police said Saturday.

The blast occurred in the Nowgam area of ​​Srinagar, the region’s main city, on Friday night as a team of forensic experts and police officers were examining the explosive material, said Nalin Prabhat, the region’s director general of police. He ruled out any foul play and said it was an accident.

Among the dead were six police and forensic officials, two civil administrators and one civilian, authorities said. Some of the injured were in critical condition.

The huge explosion leveled the police station, setting it and several vehicles on fire. According to the Press Trust of India news agency, successive small explosions prevented immediate rescue operations.

The explosion at the police station occurred days after Monday’s. Deadly car explosion in New Delhiwhich killed at least eight people near the city’s historic Red Fort. Indian officials called it a “heinous terrorist incident” carried out by “anti-national forces.” The car explosion came hours after Kashmir police said they had dismantled a suspected militant cell operating in the disputed region, arresting at least seven people, including two doctors from Indian cities, and seizing a large cache of bomb-making material in the city of Faridabad, near New Delhi.

Indian security agencies have since carried out a series of raids in Kashmir as part of their investigation into the car blast, questioning hundreds and detaining dozens more.

Indian police said Saturday they used DNA to identify the driver of the car and that he was a doctor from Kashmir. Government forces blew up his family’s home in the southern district of Pulwama on Thursday night, officials said.

In the past, troops have demolished homes of suspects they accuse of being linked to militants fighting against Indian administration in Kashmir as punishment.

Police had taken the explosive material seized in Faridabad to Kashmir as part of their investigation and it was “safely kept in an open area” at the police station, where the investigation leading to the alleged militant cell began last month, according to Prabhat, the senior officer.

Prabhat said a team of experts was taking samples for forensic investigation when the explosion occurred, calling it an “accidental explosion.”

“Any further speculation about the cause of this incident is unnecessary,” he said.

The explosion could be heard miles away in Srinagar, locals said. Some of the victims’ body parts were recovered in nearby homes, more than 300 feet from the police station. Several houses were also damaged.

“The explosion produced a deafening roar that shook houses and opened windows and sealed them shut,” Bashir Ahmed, a resident, told The News.

Nearly a dozen relatives of Mohammad Shafi Parray, killed in the blast, gathered at his home in Nowgam and marched in protest to the police station, shouting: “We want justice.”

One of Parry’s relatives, who did not give his name, said the deceased, a tailor by profession, was summoned by police on Friday night. “Why did they (the police) take him away?” she screamed.

A local police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity in accordance with department policy, said the tailor had been called to the station to sew bags to store samples of explosive material.

India and Pakistan each administer a part of Kashmir, but both claim the territory in its entirety.

Militants in Indian-administered Kashmir have been fighting the New Delhi administration since 1989. India insists that Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. Pakistan denies the allegation and many Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle.