Ahmedabad grounded by terror hoax

Panic gripped Sardar Vallabhbhai International Airport, Ahmedabad, on Friday afternoon after two threatening phone calls were received by the airport staff. The callers threatened to hijack a SpiceJet aircraft and blow up the airport. Later, airport officials said the police had declared both the calls to be hoaxes.

The threatening calls resulted in an Ahmedabad-Jaipur SpiceJet flight getting delayed. CISF personnel, the dog squad and the bomb squad with around 50 personnel from the city police were all over the airport and had secured it for combing, soon after the calls were received.

Later in the evening, airport director BP Bhagat himself gave an account of the day’s events. He told mediapersons that at 2:14 pm, the terminal manager received a call from a phone whose number was 26464334. The caller told the manager that he had heard two people talking about hijacking a SpiceJet aircraft from Ahmedabad airport. The caller revealed his name as Bansal, and said he worked for the ICICI Bank.

“We received the next call at 3:50 pm,” Bhagat said. “This time the caller claimed his name was Majid Khan and he threatened to blow up the airport. He was calling from a phone with the number, 22869233.”

According to Bhagat, the police had traced the first call to a PCO near Law Garden. “The second call has not been traced yet,” he said.

Bhagat said that after the calls were received, a special security meeting was held with customs, the city police and CISF officials.