Delhi Police on Saturday arrested a 25-year-old man for allegedly posting threat messages to a flight at Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport.
Police said the accused, identified as Shubham Upadhyay, a resident of Uttam Nagar, has confessed to the crime and said he wanted to draw attention after seeing similar news reports on television.
Two suspicious and potential bomb threat messages were received at IGI Airport through an email account on the during the intervening night of October 25 and 26.
"Immediate action was taken and standard security protocols were followed but the threat was found to be hoax," said Deputy Commissioner of Police (IGI) Usha Rangnani.
She said a case has been registered under section 3(1)(d) of the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against Safety of Civil Aviation (SUA SCA) Act, 1982 and 351(4) the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
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This is the second arrest being made in connection with a wave of hoax bomb threats to multiple Indian airlines.
On October 16, Mumbai Police had taken a 17-year-old boy from Rajnandgaon in Chhattisgarh into custody for sending threat messages to four flights. The teenager had created an account on X in his friend’s name and posted messages to frame him over a dispute over money.
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At least 250 flights have received threats over the last 10 days, leading to diversion of routes and chaos at airports.
Delhi Police has filed eight FIRs in connection with the threat messages and also wrote to social media platforms seeking details of the accounts that posted such messages.