15 injured in blast in Maharashtra bus

Pune : At least 15 passengers were injured in an explosion which ripped through an inter-city state transport bus in Maharashtra’s Latur district Friday evening, officials said. The cause was not yet known.

The bus was on a 40-km journey from Udgir to Latur, around 325 km from here, when the blast rocked the vehicle around 7 p.m., police said.

The cause of the blast is not known and there were no fatalities, said a spokesperson for the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation.

According to preliminary investigations by senior police officials along with a dog squad, illicit liquor carried by some passenger could have caused the blast.

Latur is situated around 485 km to the south-east of Mumbai in the backward Marathwada region of the state.