Mumbai, Sep 19 Proceedings in the Bombay High Court took place as usual on Friday despite an email warning of an impending bomb explosion on the premises, which was received early in the morning at the court’s official address.
The threat was later declared a hoax by the police.
This was the second such hoax bomb threat message received by the High Court in a week, the police said.
The threat mail received on Friday came a day after a bench headed by Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad heard an appeal seeking reversal of the acquittal of all seven people, including former BJP MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, in the 2008 Malegaon blast case.
On Friday, soon after the threat email landed in the HC’s official mail inbox, an office employee alerted senior administrative officials. The information was immediately passed on to the Mumbai Police, who pressed their Bomb Detection and Disposal Squad (BDDS) and dog squad into service.
A massive combing operation was launched to cover the entire campus in South Mumbai to look for possible explosives, but the search by the BDDS personnel did not find anything objectionable, said a Mumbai Police official.
Apart from the courtrooms, the bomb squad also scanned the parking lot for judges’ vehicles and the waiting area for litigants, the police said.
The High Court’s registry, library and the advocate chambers were also scanned for possible explosives, said the police.
Earlier, on September 12, the Bombay HC received a bomb threat within minutes of a similar threat being emailed to the Delhi High Court. Both threats were found to be hoaxes after the proceedings were suspended for scanning the premises.
On the same day, the Supreme Court prohibited photography and videography using mobile phones inside its high security zone in New Delhi.
In a circular, the Supreme Court gave security personnel the right to disallow any individual, staff member, advocate or others from taking photographs or making videos inside the high security zone.
Regulating media activities on the apex court’s main premises, the circular said, the media personnel shall conduct interviews and live broadcasting of news at their designated location near the lawn in the low security zone.
“In case of violation of the guidelines by media personnel, their access to the High Security Zone of the Supreme Court may be restricted for a period of one month,” said the circular.
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