Email from Swiss server sparks bomb scare at Jaipur school

Police evacuated students from Jayshree Periwal High School and carried out a thorough search but no bombs were found

An email threatening multiple bomb explosions at a private school in Jaipur Tuesday created widespread panic. Authorities got the school vacated and police officials carried out a thorough search but no bombs were found, officials said.

The email emanating from a Switzerland-based server was received late on Monday night and came to the notice of the school administration on Tuesday morning. (Shutterstock) (HT File)

According to police, the administration of the Jayshree Periwal High School had received an email, in which the sender threatened to detonate multiple bombs inside the campus.

“We received information from the school administration about the threat around 7:30am on Tuesday. Following that several teams of the police, dog squad and anti-terrorism squad were sent to the school to conduct the search,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), West, Ashok Gupta.

The email was received late on Monday night and came to the notice of the school administration on Tuesday morning, said officials.

The students were evacuated from the school building and each room searched.

“Our cyber cell traced the email address to a server in Switzerland. Preliminary investigation suggests that this is a prank by some mischief maker. No bomb has been found during the search,” said Gupta.

“The school administration later declared holiday,” said the DCP.

However, the police said that CCTV footage from the school has revealed that unidentified people had burst crackers near it in the wee hours of Tuesday.

“The footage shows that unidentified people who came in a car burst crackers outside and near the school. We have recovered empty shells of these crackers during our search,” said Gupta.

The police said that it will be registering a case against unidentified men under section 435 of the IPC (mischief by fire or explosive substance with intention to cause damage) for the incident.

“The cyber cell is trying to unearth more details about the email and its sender,” said the police.

Sources in the police said that the officials are also exploring the possibility that the prank could have been done by some ex-student or employee of the institution.