Ahmedabad, February 27 The Regional Passport Office in Surat received a bomb threat on Friday, which turned out to be a hoax, but the email was mistakenly forwarded to post offices across the state, causing panic, police said.
The Surat Passport Office received an email at 5:55 am threatening that there would be an RDX explosion on the premises at 12:10 pm, and that the area should be evacuated, according to Assistant Commissioner of Police V R Malhotra.
A team from the Umra police station and the Bomb Detection and Disposal Squad arrived at the scene, but found nothing suspicious, he said.
The email was originally received at the Surat Passport Office only from an Outlook ID, said Deputy Superintendent of Police Divyaprakash Gohil.
"Due to a misunderstanding, all post offices in the state received the same bomb threat email, which led to panic and heightened security measures," he said.
The Surat RPO forwarded the email to the Surat police commissioner's office, with the Navsari Division Post Office listed as CC (copy to), he said.
Gohil said that it was not known why the email was copied to the Navsari post office.
However, the mix-up did not end there, as the Navsari Division Post Office sent it to the Ahmedabad Post Office, from where it was forwarded to post offices across Gujarat, including Valsad, Godhra, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, and other districts, alerting local police.