Mumbai blast footage studied; underworld suspects questioned

Mumbai investigators were examining forensic evidence and footage from closed circuit cameras Friday, the AP reports, while detectives were reportedly questioning people with links to underworld gangs in the hopes of a breakthrough in Wednesday's rush-hour explosions, which killed 18 people and wounded 133 others.

It has emerged that the attackers placed one bomb on a bus shelter, hid another under some garbage on the road and a third under an umbrella, while all were the explosive devices were known to have been made of ammonium nitrate and fitted with electronic detonators.

GlobalPost in Mumbai: Death toll rises from Mumbai blasts (VIDEO)

And as the search for suspects continued, Mumbaikars were blaming intelligence failures by police and the government for yet another terrorist attack in India's commercial center.

In the wake of the Nov. 2008 attacks, when 10 Pakistani militants went on a 60-hour gun rampage at luxury hotels, the train station and a Jewish center, killing 166 people, the Indian government promised new security measures.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald:

The promised National Counterterrorism Centre, slated for opening last year, is not yet operational, while the National Intelligence Grid, under which information would be shared between banks, railways and immigration points, is behind schedule. The registration of ships operating in Indian waters and ID cards for fishermen have also not been completed.

The paper quotes a number of entries on social networking websites and letters to newspapers condemning the government for its inaction.

And two days after the coordinated blasts, the cleanup continues, with the body parts of a person killed at Zaveri Bazaar finally taken down from an exposed position on the fourth floor of a nearby building, the Press Trust of India reports.

In the Opera House area, site of the most powerful of the three coordinated blasts, diamond traders downed shutters on Thursday in a display of solidarity for industry workers killed in the attack.

"We lost four traders," Mumbai Diamond Merchants'' Association President, Bharat Shah, told PTI.

The blast scattered diamonds, possibly worth millions of dollars, onto the street, Reuters reports, adding that about 60 percent of the world's diamonds pass through the Opera House area in south Mumbai.

"Diamonds move from office to office unseen. People carrying them are not identified and there is security in the anonymity," Rajiv Popley, director of Popley Group,  told Reuters.

Traders carry the diamonds in their pockets, often rolled in tissue paper. They dress casually, blending with the thousands of commuters that pass through the nearby rail station.