Mamata Banerjee on Thursday morning visited SSKM Hospital where the minister of state for labour, Jakir Hossain, and Trinamul supporters injured in an explosion in Murshidabad the night before were admitted and alleged a conspiracy to assassinate her cabinet colleague before the Assembly polls.

Calling it a “grisly, horrific” incident, the chief minister said she had deployed multiple state-run agencies to probe the matter, which she accused the Centre of taking lightly.

A special investigation team headed by the additional director-general (CID) and comprising officers from the state special task force, intelligence branch, counter insurgency force and local police has been formed to probe the attack.

“I spoke to him (Hossain) just before he was taken to the operating theatre, over the phone…. His surgery isn’t over yet. I met his wife. Another 10 people who were injured, three-four of them grievously injured. Four more such patients coming here,” Mamata said at SSKM.

Besides Hossain, at least 15 people injured in the blast at Nimtita station have been admitted to the trauma care unit of SSKM.

Doctors said the condition of two — Shamiul Seikh and Mashem Ali — was extremely critical.

On Thursday afternoon, a team of surgeons operated on a part of the minister’s heel bone before moving on to repair a few blood veins that were severed near the heel.

A preliminary inquiry suggested an improvised explosive device had been used.

“The matter is grave, it is grisly, horrific…. One of the boys with him, his nephew, told me… it was a remotely triggered blast…. Of course, it was deliberate,” Mamata said.

“It took place at a railway station. There were purportedly no railway police personnel there at the time. The place was also dark…. Inside a railway station, the law and order is the Centre’s responsibility, not the state’s,” she said.

At a party event later in the day, Mamata said she believed Murshidabad would be in the first phase of the Assembly polls, which is why “they” tried to have Hossain eliminated.

She announced a compensation of Rs 5 lakh for those seriously injured and Rs 1 lakh for those with minor injuries.

Sources said a wire and remains of two batteries found on the railway track adjoining the blast site made the sleuths suspect that the blast was triggered using a detonator near the spot.