GUWAHATI, India, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Two people were killed and five others injured on Wednesday evening when a powerful bomb exploded in a busy marketplace in Dispur, capital of northeast India's troubled state of Assam, authorities said. Police said they suspected rebels belonging to the separatist United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) were behind the attack, which came the day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited the state and offered to talk to the rebels. "We are yet to confirm the details of the blast, but preliminary investigation points to the handiwork of the ULFA," Nitul Gogoi, Dispur's superintendent of police, told Reuters. Gogoi said the bomb was placed in a busy vegetable market, near the state assembly and some of the injured included vendors and customers. Earlier on Wednesday, two civilians were wounded when suspected rebels attacked a military convoy in front of a state government guest house in Goalpara, about 100 km (70 miles) west of Guwahati, Assam's main city. Prime Minister Singh on Tuesday visited the state, which has substantial resources of oil and tea, to meet families of more than 70 people who authorities say were killed by ULFA guerrillas earlier this month. Singh said government was willing to talk to the rebels, provided they rejected violence. The insurgency -- which ULFA says is aimed at gaining Assam's independence from India -- has killed more than 20,000 people since it began in 1979.
