A bomb threat was received on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI)’s customer care number yesterday, during which the caller claimed to be the “CEO of Lashkar-e-Taiba”, sources said.
The Lashkar-e-Taiba terror group had carried out the 2008 Mumbai attacks, one of the deadliest terror attacks in India.
The call came on the helpline number around 11 am on Saturday and he threatened to blow up the central bank with a bomb, they said. He said he was the “CEO” of the banned group and sang a song over the phone before issuing the threat, sources said.
Mumbai Police has filed a case and is trying to hunt down the caller.
The bomb threat comes amid a series of hoax calls to airlines that grounded hundreds of flights over the past two months, leading to a concern for aviators and security agencies.
An IndiGo flight from Nagpur to Kolkata made an emergency landing in Raipur on Thursday after a bomb threat that turned out to be fake – this was the latest such incident.
The central government has taken up the issue with great concern and warned social media platforms to act against the spread of such misinformation or lose exemptions that they enjoy in India.
The Information Technology Ministry had said in an advisory that such bomb hoaxes not only affect the citizens but also destabilise the country’s economic security.
One of the bomb hoaxes last month turned out to be a plot by a school dropout in Chhattisgarh to frame his friend.