Delhi airport, several schools receive bomb threats; declared hoax

The Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL), which operates IGIA, confirmed receiving the email. Dozens of schools that received the threats included DPS R K Puram, Amity International, Birla Vidya Niketan and Gyan Bharati. The sender described himself as “the child of evil”.

School administrations promptly alerted local police, said officers. DPS R K Puram forwarded the email to the local station house officer (SHO) in the morning. Police teams, accompanied by bomb detection and disposal squads and dog units, were dispatched to all such sites. Senior officers said no suspicious objects were recovered.

On September 20, multiple institutions in the city were targeted with such hoax emails sent from different addresses with the subject line — “Bombs placed in your building, react or face disaster”. That email, signed off with the alias “Azuk,” declared the sender to be “the definition of pure hatred”. Schools, including DPS Dwarka, Sarvodaya Vidyalaya and Krishna Model also received threatening phone calls that morning. While no explosives were found, DPS Dwarka announced the closure of its premises, sending students home and postponing mid-term examinations.

The subject line was also used in the emails sent on Sunday.

Over the past few months, such emails have repeatedly disrupted business as usual in several parts of the Capital.

In July, more than 40 schools received threat emails in a single morning. In August, 32 private schools were targeted within a week, with one student later found to have sent a hoax threat to his school to avoid examinations.

Even as several such emails have been traced to overseas servers using VPN or masked accounts, a few led investigators to juveniles misusing online anonymity, said officers.

The threats have not been confined to schools. Two weeks ago, the Delhi High Court was evacuated following an email claiming that a bomb was planted in a judge’s chamber. That too turned out to be a hoax.