As Hyderabad observed the third anniversary of the bomb blast at the Mecca Masjid, Union Home Minister P Chidambaram has for the first time publicly confirmed the involvement of Hindu extremists in the blast in Mecca Masjid.

On a day when Muslims in Hyderabad observed a bandh by shutting down their businesses and shops and police was on a high alert fearing further terror attacks to avenge the blast and the firing, Chidambaram told a television channel that those arrested in connection with the blast in Ajmer Dargah, were also involved in Mecca Masjid blast.

Meanwhile Hyderabad police, still reeling under last Friday's attack by three unidentified persons killing a constable in old city, had a sigh of relief as the anniversary day passed off peacefully.

With the Intelligence Bureau warning of possibility of more such attack on the anniversary, elaborate security arrangements were made in the city. Additional police force was brought from other districts and deployed in sensitive places. Armed pickets were deployed in the old city and patrolling was intensified. In view of the incidents of attacks on the unarmed police men both this year and last year, Hyderabad police commissioner A K Khan had ordered every policemen to carry a weapon.

Some of the family members of the victims of the blast as well as the police firing gathered at the Mecca Masjid and prayed. Sabira Begum, mother of a blast victim Nayeem Shaiq was among them. Holding a photo of her son, Sabira Begum broke down. "Every anniversary, those memories keep haunting me. I can never forget it. They (perpetrators) of the blast have destroyed my family and many other families".

Normally jam packed roads of the old city wore a deserted look as Muslim shopkeepers in Madina, Patthargatti and Chariminar area observing a bandh.