Prankster’s Hoax Call Delays Gitanjali Express

A hoax call claiming that a bomb had been kept in Howrah-CST Mumbai 12860 Up Gitanjali Express delayed the train for over half an hour on Tuesday as it was thoroughly checked before and restarting its journey.

"A telephone call was received at Mumbai Central police control room claiming that there was a bomb in Gitanjali Express," South Eastern Railway (SER) spokesman Sanjoy Ghosh said. "The information was passed on to SER and the train, which had departed from Howrah station at 1.50 PM, was stopped at Santragachi station at 2.13 PM," Ghosh said.

Santragachi is about 10 kms away from Howrah station. Government Railway Police (GRP) personnel, aided by sniffer dogs searched all compartments of the train thoroughly, before they declared that nothing suspicious was found. The train was declared safe for travel and restarted its journey towards CST Mumbai after a delay of 35 minutes.