NEW DELHI/NOIDA, May 1: In a scare of unprecedented scale, at least 100 schools in the Delhi NCR area received an identical bomb threat by email early Wednesday, triggering mass evacuations and massive searches as panicked parents rushed to pick up their children.
The threat was declared a hoax as “nothing objectionable” was found during searches, police said.
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Police sources said that the email schools received had the same source, suspected to be sent from Russia aimed at creating panic.
They added that it is also possible that culprits may have masked their identity using the dark net.
A senior officer said that since the incident is related to national security, Delhi Police is likely to register an FIR under stringent sections of the IPC.
According to Delhi Fire Service (DFS), at least 97 calls from different schools have been received till 12 noon on Wednesday. They started receiving calls about the bomb threat at 6 am, an officer said.
An official said that DFS also received calls even after noon and firefighters are still on the ground.
Multiple private schools in Noida, Greater Noida, Ghaziabad and Gurugram also received the bomb threat but local police dismissed them as hoax.
Visuals from many schools showed parents assembling outside schools to pick their children. The school administrations were seen making announcements on the microphone while parents rushed to collect their wards.
The bomb threat was received in 24 private schools in east Delhi, 18 schools in south Delhi, 21 schools in west Delhi and 10 schools in Shahdara, police said.
Earlier in the day, the Union home ministry said that there was no need to panic as the threat appeared to be a hoax. Delhi Police and security agencies are taking all necessary steps as per protocol, it said.
Delhi Police said it has conducted a thorough check of all schools that received the bomb threat but found nothing.
“Some schools of Delhi received emails regarding bomb threats. Delhi Police has conducted thorough checks of all such schools as per protocol,” Delhi Police said in a post on X.
“Nothing objectionable has been found. It appears that these calls seem to be hoax. We request the public not to panic and maintain peace,” it said.
Police said the content of the mail to every school is the same, adding that it was sent from a user with email id, sawariim@mail.Ru.
“Kill them wherever you meet and drive them out of the places from which they drove you. There are many explosive devices in the school…” reads the identical email sent to all schools.
Lt Governor VK Saxena visited Model Town’s DAV school — which was among the schools that received the bomb scare — and said that Delhi Police has traced the origin of the threat emails. He assured that the culprits will be given strict punishment.
Delhi Education Minister Atishi said nothing was found in the schools and requested parents not to panic.
“We are in constant touch with the police and the schools. Would request parents and citizens not to panic. School authorities will be in touch with parents wherever needed,” Atishi said in a post on X.
Concerned parents at Mayur Vihar’s Mother’s Mary school and Chanakyapuri’s Sanskriti School were seen assembling outside the premises to pick their children.
“I dropped my child 10-15 minutes ago. Then I received a call from the school to take my child back due to some emergency,” Vijay Kumar, a parent, said.
“I had come to drop off my children. I saw a lot of people had gathered here and there were shouts of people coming from inside the school. When we inquired, we didn’t get any satisfactory response,” said Manoj Kumar, parent of a student studying in the school.
Fire tenders, ambulances and lines of police vehicles were seen on stand-by outside the schools, while bomb detection teams and bomb disposal squads were conducting searches inside the schools.
Kirti, another parent, said she dropped her son at BGS International School, Dwarka, and was waiting outside for him to go inside when she saw him return back with school staff.
“As usual I was waiting outside of the school when I saw my son returning back along with all the staff members. I was very worried. When some people shouted that there was a bomb in school, I immediately asked my son to sit on my scooter,” she said.
Several schools had sent messages to parents to urgently pick their wards from the school.
In Noida too, bomb disposal squads, sniffer dogs were rushed to the schools which received the threat. Overall security was beefed up in the twin cities as a precautionary measure.
The threat was sent to branches of Delhi Public School (DPS) in Noida and Greater Noida, and some other schools via emails by an anonymous sender, Noida Police officials said.
“All schools are safe. Ignore SPAM/ HOAX mails. On behalf of Noida Police, the police commissioner appeals to all school managers and parents to not believe any rumours,” Noida Police Commissioner Laxmi Singh posted on X in Hindi.
Additional Commissioner of Police (law and order) Shivhari Meena said, “All such schools that received the threats were thoroughly checked and sanitised. At no place any such thing (threat) has come to light and it is proved that the email was sent to trigger a rumour.”
Local police officials they were first alerted about the emails around 6.45 am after which seniors were briefed, and security personnel and the fire brigade rushed to the schools.
At DPS Noida Sector 30, a school security personnel told PTI that by 8 am almost all students were inside the campus except for primary sections, whose classes begin at 9 am. However, shortly after, the students were sent back, the staffer said.
Other schools that did not receive bomb threats were also flooded with queries by parents and guardians who were worried about their wards’ safety.
According to police officials, initial investigations suggest that mails have been sent to multiple locations since Tuesday which appear to have the same pattern. (PTI)
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