Union Water Resources Minister Harish Rawat on Sunday condemned the explosions that rocked the Mahabodhi temple complex in Bodh Gaya, and said that it was an attempt by destructive elements to disturb the peace and tranquillity of the country.
"This is a big matter of concern. There are some destructive elements, which wants to hamper peace in India and strict action would be taken against them," he told the media in Haridwar.
Meanwhile, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesperson Meenakshi Lekhi hit out at the government, saying that the authorities should have acted promptly on seeking prior information of a terror threat to the Buddhist shrine.
"It seems that a new atmosphere is building in the country where the LeT operatives and Indian Mujahideen and people belonging to similar organization are God's men and all the security and investigative agencies are devils. Due to this, the determination of people working in these agencies is being affected," Lekhi told the media in New Delhi.
"Since the government is ineffective, questions that should be raised to them are being directed towards those who are actually working for the safety of the citizens. If there was any intelligence report about the explosions then the state government should have acted upon it on time," she added.
Nine serial explosions rocked the internationally renowned temple town of Bodhgaya, injuring two monks in the blasts suspected to be engineered by some terrorist organisation.
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The blasts took place between 5:30 to 5:58 a.m.
An alert has been issued in the entire state with additional security forces being deployed at all religious places.