Delhi bomb threat: Class 11 girl held, she wanted long weekend, says police

New Delhi: The Delhi Police have said that they apprehended a Class 11 girl of a private school in Central Delhi, for allegedly sending a bomb threat to her own school. The 16-year-old reportedly sent the mail, hoping to get a 4-day-long weekend. The mail was sent on Friday. She had hoped that following the threat, the school would close for 4 days.

Monday is a public holiday for Valmiki Jayanti, so getting Friday off would mean 4 days of holidays, thought the girl, according to the police.

This is only for a second time that the Delhi Police have managed to trace the sender of a police bomb hoax, since the threat emails started landing in the mailbox of several schools in waves in 2024. Just like in the first case, this girl was also undone by the Virtual Private Network (VPN) that she used to send the threat mail.

Free VPN failed under heavy load

A police officer said that after thorough checks at the school. Following the mail, the threat was declared a hoax. According to a report in Hindustan Times, the girl allegedly sent the email using her mother’s mobile phone, which had a free VPN.

However to the girl’s bad luck, the VPN failed under heavy load and exposed the phone’s real IP address and location.

One of the officers said that they contacted the service providers and got information about the device used to send the mail and also the IP address of the phone. They examined it and finally zeroed in on the suspect – who was the Class 11 student.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (south) Anant Mittal, said that the threat email had the subject line as ‘Bombs Placed In Your Building’. Soon after the mail was received, the school authorities contacted the police, who launched an investigation. The DCP said that given the spike in bomb threat emails in recent months, a technical analysis was immediately launched. He added that later, the sender was found to be a student of the same school.

The girl was booked under the Juvenile Justice Act and further investigations are on in the case, said the official. Mittal also credited the Cyber Police Station’s “prompt response, technical expertise and effective digital investigation.”

Earlier a 17-year-old was apprehended by the South District Police, for allegedly sending mass threat mails to school. He was also using a VPN and had sent mails to schools on 10 to 12 occasions, before he was apprehended, as a weakness in the free VPN he was using, gave investigators a lead. The boy was arrested in January 2025.