News Mania Desk / Piyal Chatterjee / 23rd October 2024
The Union Ministry of Electronics and IT today criticized social networking platform X (previously Twitter), which was the conduit for many of the bomb threats that airlines had been receiving in recent days. A virtual conference with officials from airlines and social media sites like X and Meta was presided over by Joint Secretary Sanket S. Bhondve. According to sources, the official accused “X abetting crime” and asked company representatives about the measures taken to prevent the spread of such concerning rumors.
Over the previous two days, bomb threats have been sent to over 120 Indian carrier flights. Such threats were received by 30 IndiGo, Vistara, and Air India planes as recently as yesterday. The airlines claimed to have complied with conventional operating procedures, which included notifying authorities and adhering to security measures.
The government is working to address the issue without endangering the safety of passengers, according to Civil Aviation Minister K Rammohan Naidu, who gave a briefing on the matter on Monday. He went on to say that individuals spreading false threats will be subject to severe consequences, such as being placed on a no-fly list. The Suppression of Unlawful Acts against Safety of Civil Aviation Act will be amended by the government to allow for the prosecution of offenses committed while an aircraft is on the ground. At the moment, in-flight offenses are mostly covered by aviation security standards.
We are trying to make amendments and the legal team has worked on it… We need consultations with other ministries also… we are definitively pushing forward to have changes in the Act also so that it addresses offences that happen when the flight is on the ground and also make it cognizable offence,” he said.
Asked if there could be a conspiracy behind the barrage of threats, the minister said a thorough investigation was underway.
“Without investigation, we cannot put out any pattern… let us wait for the completion of the investigation,” he added. “We are keeping ourselves dynamic and not rigid… assessing and learning from what is happening. Everything is taken on a case-by-case basis. Based on our learning, we are trying to assess the situation,” the minister said. “We are continuously talking to law enforcement agencies. We are pushing to speed up the process. While we are trying to efficiently tackle the situation, we are not compromising on the safety and security,” Mr Naidu added.
Despite the fact that these were fictitious threats, he emphasized that they must be treated seriously. Airport security has been improved, and checkpoints are being inspected more frequently. “We have increased (the number of) CCTV cameras so that airports get monitored more thoroughly.”
