Red Fort blast toll climbs to 15 as two injured die in hospital

The death toll from the November 10 Red Fort blast has risen to 15 after two more injured victims died at LNJP Hospital on Monday, officials said.

The latest casualties have been identified as Lukmaan (50) and Vinay Pathak (50), according to a senior police officer, as quoted by PTI.

Another injured person, Bilal, had died during treatment last Thursday, bringing the toll to 13 at the time. With the two additional deaths, the number of fatalities from the high-intensity explosion has now reached 15, while several others remain hospitalised.

Separately, investigators probing the Red Fort car explosion now suspect that Dr Umar Un Nabi, a Jaish-e-Mohammed–linked doctor, may have acted like a “shoe bomber.” They found one of his shoes under the driver’s seat of the Hyundai i20 used in the attack, close to the right front tyre. Inside that shoe was a metal-like component, which forensic teams believe functioned as an initiation device for the explosion.

Investigators have found striking similarities to Richard Reid’s infamous 2001 “shoe bomber” attack—in both cases, explosive TATP (colloquially called the “mother of Satan”) was concealed in footwear. Based on the evidence, they are increasingly convinced that Umar adopted a comparable method to trigger the car bomb.

Additional materials recovered from under the car’s rear seat suggest that the bomb configuration was more elaborate than previously thought. Investigators believe a Jaish terror cell had stockpiled large quantities of TATP in preparation for a major strike, with the Red Fort attack being a central part of their plan.

Financial links have also emerged. About Rs 20 lakh appears to have been funnelled into this terror module through Dr Shaheen Shahid, who allegedly handled the movement of funds for the Delhi operation. According to officials, money and resources flowed systematically, helping the conspirators to build up their network and execute the attack.

According to officials, the Jaish-linked terror module had devised a multi-city strike plan, codenamed “D-6.” Their original strategy (‘Plan A’) allegedly involved coordinated attacks on the anniversary of the Babri Masjid demolition—though that didn’t go as planned. Instead, ‘Plan B’ was carried out with the vehicle blast in Delhi, a high-impact symbolic target close to the Red Fort.