KARACHI - A stolen car with a bomb installed inside exploded at a vacant plot in Khayaban-e-Mujahid area of Defence Housing Authority in the early hours of Monday.

Following the blast, extra contingent of the law enforcers including police and Rangers reached the site and cordoned off the scene.

Police officials said that the car was parked in an empty plot, however, no loss of life was reported. The firefighters reached the site along with the law enforcers to extinguish the fire.

DIG South Javed Alam Odho also visited the scene and talking to the newsmen said that the blast was carried out to create panic and harassment and there was no high value target in the area. He said that there would be a massive loss if the gas cylinders could also exploded along with the bomb.

DIG further said that a total six LPG cylinder and a car’s own CNG cylinder remained safe in the blast, adding that cylinders could not be exploded. He said that police investigators are trying to obtain the footages from the CCTV cameras installed in the surrounding to watch the culprits parked the car at the said place.

Bomb disposal squad’s experts said that LPG cylinders were attached with a bomb to make the blast furthermore harmful but not a single cylinder exploded.

Police officials said that the white car was stolen from Jamshed Quarters area on Monday evening at around 7pm, adding that the owner of a car also registered a complaint with the police station within half an hour of the incident.

Police officials said that the car was completely damaged in the blast, adding that it was registered on a name of a person, namely Arshad Awan while the missing report was registered on behalf of his son, Ashfaq Awan. The car was earlier stolen in 2007 from Boat Basin area and later found from SITE area after five days of stealing.

He said that the car owner is a government employee purchased the car in recent past. The investigation of a case was transferred to the Counter-Terrorism Department to ascertain the motive behind the explosion and the group of militant behind the incident.