According to the police, emails threatening explosions that were sent to at least 36 schools in Ahmedabad on the eve of the May 7 election have been traced back to Pakistan. They were described as an attempt to incite fear among the populace before voting.

On May 7, Gujarat’s Lok Sabha elections for 25 of the 26 seats were conducted in a single phase. With no opposition, the candidate in Surat has already won.

In a press release, the Ahmedabad crime branch stated, “The emails were sent from the’mail.ru’ domain, in which a man impersonating Tauheed Liaquat sent them to all the schools to spread fear among voters and Indian citizens.”

Liaquat had also assumed another identity as Hamad Javed. The person with these names was operating from Faisalabad district of Pakistan, Joint Commissioner of Police Sharad Singhal said.

The same person has created various identities on different social media platforms, one of them being that of Hamad Javed. These social media platforms are used to spread anti-India messages, rumours and fear among Indians, he said.

“It is possible that the name was created to spread fear and rumour. But one thing is certain the emails were sent using the mail.ru domain and the location was traced to the Faisalabad cantonment area in Pakistan,” he said.

The name of this accused has also been revealed during a honeytrap investigation by another agency, the official said.

Further investigation is underway and agencies like the Intelligence Bureau (IB), Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS), National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) and Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) have been contacted, Singhal said.

Several of the 36 schools that had received the threat email from the Russian domain ‘mail.ru’ were designated as polling booths.

The email was received on May 6, a day before the voting in the city where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah exercised their franchise.

The email’s content was identical to that of a recent letter delivered to Delhi’s schools. After the schools were searched, nothing suspicious or explosive was discovered. It was sent using the Russian domain “mail.ru.”

The official stated that a technical monitoring was subsequently started in order to identify the email’s sender.

The email containing threats was sent to several schools, including Anand Niketan and DPS in Bopal, Army Cantonment on Airport Road, Udgam School on SG Highway, Calorx School in Ghatlodia, and Kendriya Vidyalaya at Chandkheda.

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