SRINAGAR, India - At least 50 people, including 20 children, were wounded on Thursday in a grenade attack by militants outside a missionary school in Indian Kashmir's summer capital, police said. The blast near the school in Srinagar's commercial heart was the second rebel attack in two days in the city, the urban hub of a 15-year revolt against Indian rule. "At least 50 people, 20 of them school children, have been injured in the grenade attack by militants," said a police spokesman. Doctors said at least four of the victims, two of them schoolgirls, were in critical condition.Militants threw the grenade at a slow-moving security vehicle near the all-boy Tyndale Biscoe school whose pupils ranged in age from four to 18, police said. It missed its target and exploded among parents, children and other people near the school gates just as classes were ending for the day, police said. Children and adults fled in panic, dropping schoolbags on the ground. Parents shrieking their children's names rushed to the school to look for their children. "I don't know where my son is," said one weeping mother, Zubiada Javed. "He should be home by now. Where can I find him?" she asked frantically.
Shopkeepers, passersby and security personnel carried victims with bloodstained clothes to cars and ambulances to be taken to hospital. "The area has been sealed off and searches launched to arrest the militants involved in the attack," a paramilitary officer told AFP. No militant outfit claimed immediate responsibility for the attack. "At least four of the injured are in critical condition," a doctor on duty said, as he appealed for more doctors and blood donations.
The boys' school adjoins the Mallinson Girls' School, both run by Christian missionaries. The schools, the oldest missionary schools in the region, have a total enrolment of 1,000 students. The blast shook the main shopping area known as Lal Chowk, or Red Square, which is often targeted by rebels due to its commercial importance. The square is guarded and dotted by some half-a-dozen security bunkers. "The attackers are believed to have taken advantage of the confusion to
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