Hoax threat on Jet: Cops seize laptop, printer used by Mumbai businessman to write note

A flight attendant found the note that threatened that the plane was being hijacked, which led to an emergency landing of the Mumbai-Delhi flight at Ahmedabad airport.

The Ahmedabad police on Tuesday visited the Thane office of Birju Kishore Salla, the businessman who left a hoax note in the lavatory of a flight in mid-air, and seized the laptop and printer allegedly used to write and print the note.

Birju Kishore Salla allegedly left the hoax note in the washroom of the aircraft.

On Monday, the Jet Airways flight was on its way from Mumbai to Delhi when a flight attendant found the note, which threatened to hijack the plane, leading to an emergency landing at Ahmedabad airport. Salla, 36, who was detained on the same day for questioning by the Ahmedabad crime branch, was formally arrested on Monday night and charged under the new Anti-Hijacking Act, 2016, said Deepan Bhadran, deputy commissioner of Ahmedabad crime branch.

After the aircraft landed at Ahmedabad around 3.45am, passengers were searched and Salla, whom flight attendants suspected, was taken to the crime branch office for interrogation.

He claimed that he wrote the letter because he was served breakfast with a cockroach aboard a Mumbai-Rajkot flight on July 6, 2016. At that time, the airline had apologised for the food and offered him a replacement.