62 hoax calls in a week send security agencies in a tizzy, airlines lose crores

New Delhi: A flurry of fake bomb threats at the Delhi airport over the past one week has thrown authorities into a tizzy.

CISF sources said as many as 62 threat calls that were specific in nature were received at Indira Gandhi International Airport and that 44 of them were made on a single day.

Such threat calls throw the entire security apparatus out of gear, besides incurring a huge cost on the airlines and turning the experience into a nightmare for passengers. But arrests in these cases, however, are very few.

CNN-IBN has accessed one these fake threat calls received at the Delhi airport in which the caller gives "specific" but false information about a bomb on a Kathmandu-bound plane. "Time bomb rakha gaya hai (A time bomb has been placed)," the caller says while giving details about the flight.

The financial losses incurred by the airlines because of these bomb hoaxes runs into crores of rupees.

Once a threat call is received the bomb threat assessment committee steps in and the aircraft is sent to an isolation bay. An anti-sabotage drill is conducted, baggage and cargo re-screened and passengers frisked again.

If a plane is mid-air and is diverted, an airline spends Rs 3-4 lakh per hour on fuel. If the delay is over four hours, a new crew has to be brought in and passengers have to be accommodated in hotels.

In case of an international flight, an airline has to provide onward connectivity. And in case of long delays there could be a cascading effect and the entire network is effected.

Though there is a stringent law in place -- Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against Safety of Civil Aviation -- which prescribes a maximum punishment of life imprisonment, its implementation has become difficult.

Taj Hassan, Special Commissioner of Police (Crime), Delhi Police, said, "The calls are from VoIP and such calls are Internet calls. It becomes difficult to fix the identity. With someone sitting abroad or sending a VOIP call it takes time to judge whether it's real or hoax."

Delhi Police are acknowledging their limitations and a specialised agency is the need of the hour. But the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) has been headless without a commissioner for over three years.

BCAS is the body under MoCA that deals with all matters pertaining to security. But it is faced with a severe manpower crunch with just 111 personnel. What is especially lacking are inspectors to deal with such threat calls.