QUETTA, May 24 Two people were killed and 16 others, women and children among them, injured when a bomb exploded in a rickshaw on the Airport road on Monday.

CCPO Shabbir Sheikh told Dawn that the bomb was detonated by remote control.

Sources said Tehrik-i-Fiqa-i-Jaffaria Pakistan Chairman Alama Sajid Naqvi had passed through the area on his way to the airport just 20 minutes before the blast.

A car of Alama Mehdi Najfi, a local leader of TFJP, and some 11 other vehicles were damaged.

However, Alama Najfi, who was returning from the airport after seeing off Alama Naqvi, escaped unhurt.

Police identified the deceased as Hameedullah, driver of the pick-up, and Baloch Khan. The bodies and the injured were taken to the civil hospital, where condition of seven children and a woman was stated to be serious.

Bomb disposal personnel said that around 15 kg of explosives was planted in the rickshaw, which was completely destroyed.

Bomb disposal personnel defused two other bombs which were planted in the bathroom of the directorate of Excise and Taxation on Sariab road.

Another bomb went off near the Excise and Taxation directorate late on Sunday night and damaged a wall of the building.—Staff Correspondent