The Delhi High Court on Monday sought response from the Delhi Government and Police officials in a plea seeking a detailed action plan to deal with bomb threats in schools.
A single-judge Justice Prathiba M Singh issued a notice on the petition filed by Advocate Arpit Bhargava, claiming that there is currently no action plan in place to deal with such incidents “which can cause havoc in anyone’s family and have a large impact.”
The matter has been scheduled for further hearing on 31st July, 2023.
The plea requests that an action plan be developed to deal with “repeated incidents of bomb threats” in Delhi schools. It also states that regular evacuation drills and other exercises must be carried out for the safety and security of students in schools.
Advocate Bhargava has relied on an incident that occurred in November of last year, when an email about a bomb in the Indian School was received, which later turned out to be a hoax.
“Another school was targeted in a similar manner [in April] wherein some miscreant sent an email in relation to presence of bomb in DPS Mathura Road school premises thereby leading to chaos, mental and emotional trauma for one and all including the Petitioner whose child studies in the same school. However, thankfully, it again turned out to be a hoax,” the plea reads.
It has been submitted that a mechanism be put in place to prevent such incidents from happening again.
Advocate Bhargava contended that if children studying in schools are constantly threatened, it is the collective failure of all to provide a safe environment.
“Urgent need of the hour is to address the issue (s) raised in the instant petition without any further delay and to have a detailed action plan formulated in regard to such incidents of bomb threats in schools and implement the same in a time bound manner with detailed Standard Operating Procedures to be followed for one and all including regular evacuation drills involving each and every parent and child, automatic intimation in case of emergency instead of manual calling, streamlining process outside schools to eliminate chance of chaos and such other improvements,” the plea further stated.
