Students behind bomb threats to four schools in Delhi, Gurgaon: Police

On November 29, a day after a blast in Prashant Vihar, two siblings allegedly sent a bomb threat email to their school to postpone exams, a police officer said. “A check was conducted at the school and the threat turned out to be a hoax. The students were let go after counselling,” a police officer said.

On December 13, around 30 schools in Delhi got threat emails. Police said a Class VII boy was behind one of them and he allegedly sent the e-mail to avoid taking an exam. He was located on Tuesday and was let go after counselling, officers said.

“One of the emails sent to a school in Rohini was from a seventh-standard boy. We were able to trace that because he did not use a VPN,” said DCP (Special Cell) Pratiksha Godara.

“The mail was sent by the boy using a fake email ID he created. He had an exam the very next day, and wanted to avoid it,” a police officer said.

In the same December 13 hoax cases, police had earlier said another child was behind an email to a Paschim Vihar school. “This student was located hours after it was found that he allegedly sent the email… He did not want to sit for his exams and thus sent the email… He was counselled by the counselor and allowed to leave,” said a senior officer.

In the fourth case, of a bomb threat sent to a Gurgaon school on Wednesday, police claimed a 12-year-old was behind it. According to a police officer, the boy wrote the email on December 18 using a fake email ID, which said there would be a blast on Thursday, to his own school.

On Wednesday, the school reported the incident to the Cyber Police station (South) in Gurgaon. “An FIR under relevant sections was registered. A team under SHO Naveen Kumar, under the supervision of ACP Priyanshu Deewan, led the investigation and traced the email to a 12-year-old minor. He is a student of the same school,” a Gurgaon police spokesperson said.

Police said the boy was questioned on Saturday and allegedly said he wanted classes to be shifted to the online mode. “The boy is cooperating. Further investigation is underway,” a police officer who was aware of the matter said.

More than 100 schools in Delhi-NCR have received bomb threats in the past two weeks, with all of them being declared hoaxes.

The first case of threats to Delhi schools and hospitals was reported in May. Several other government installations, including Tihar Jail and some Union Ministry departments, also received bomb threats.

Most of the e-mails sent, starting from the one in May to the last 10 days, used the Virtual Private Network (VPN). A senior police officer said, “It is not possible when e-mails are sent through VPN to detect the location; even if the location is determined, it would show several places, sometimes Sweden, Netherlands, or any other country in Europe. Currently, India doesn’t have its own VPN network so all these VPNs being used for mails are based abroad. If India had its own VPN network, then it would be bound by laws in the country and details would have to be shared with the law-enforcement agencies.”