Mumbai: The police on Sunday (May 19) received a call saying there was a bomb planted at McDonald’s in Dadar but the police team along with the bomb squad didn’t find anything at the said spot. The hoax call was made just a day ahead of polling in Mumbai ahead of fifth phase of voting for the Lok Sabha Elections 2024. This was the second hoax bomb call in the cuty within 72 hours.
On Saturday, a 52-year-old unemployed man was arrested from Andheri after he called the Mumbai Police control room warning of a ‘major incident’ at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s election rally at Dadar’s Shivaji Park on Friday.
In Sunday’s (May 19) incident, the unknown caller informed the control room saying he ‘overheard’ a conversation between two people on a bus who were talking about a bomb being planted at the McDonald’s – which is located in both east and west areas – and hence he was reporting it for safety purposes. The caller added that the two people were planning to ‘blow up the McDonald’s’.
As per standard operating procedure (SOP), several police teams along with the Bomb Detection and Disposal Squads (BDDS) were deployed on the spots. Despite multiple inspections, they found no suspicious objects or bombs as said by the caller. Police then started the probe to find out more about the caller.
In the previous incident, an Andheri-based man identified as Kannappa S Somsundaram made the call to the Mumbai Police control room where he said a ‘major incident’ would occur at Narendra Modi’s election rally in Shivaji Park, Dadar, on Friday. After the SOP, police found nothing at spots during and after the rally, followed by a case being registered at Azad Maidan police station. Reddy’s calls were traced and he was placed under arrest. According to Police, Reddy, who ran a hotel earlier and is currently unemployed, was seeing the pre-coverage news of Modi’s rally and was worried about the risk the PM would face given the number of crowds that will be present as spectators. He allegedly made the call to ‘beef up’ the security, said a police official.
Reddy was allegedly worried about all the VVIPs – Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, his deputies Devendra Fadnavis and Ajit Pawar and MNS Chief Raj Thackeray – who were going to be at the rally.
Reddy lived in a chawl at Mhatar Pada Road in Andheri, said the official. He was booked under sections 505(1)(B) (statements conducting to public mischief), 505 (2) (statements creating or promoting enmity, hatred or ill-will between classes) and 182 (giving false information to a public servant to cause him to use his lawful power to the injury or annoyance of any person) of the Indian Penal Code. The hoax caller of McDonald’s matter shall be, if held, will be arrested under similar sections.
