The Reserve Bank of India received an email, threatening to blow up the bank’s headquarters in Mumbai with explosives.
The threat mail was sent to the official email ID of RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra in the Russian language on Thursday, December 12. Upon receiving the input about the threat email, the Mumbai Police filed a case against the sender under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and launched a probe.
Speaking about the threat email, a senior Mumbai Police said, “A threatening email was received on the official website of the Reserve Bank of India. The email was in Russian and warned to blow up the bank. A case has been registered against an unknown accused in Mata Ramabai Marg (MRA Marg) police station. An investigation into the matter is underway”.
According to sources, Mumbai Police officials are investigating whether a VPN was used to send the email and are also tracing the IP address of the email sender. The threat email came days after new RBI Governor, Sanjay Malhotra, took charge as the 26th Governor of the Reserve Bank, replacing Shaktikanta Das who demitted office after six years.
Malhotra, an IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre, was selected by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Earlier last month, the RBI customer care centre in Mumbai also received a threat call from a man claiming to be the “CEO” of the Pakistan-based terror organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba.
The man, who identified himself as the “CEO of Lashkar-e-Taiba,” called the RBI and asked officials to block the back road, claiming that an electric car had broken down. The matter was immediately escalated to the Mumbai Police, who conducted a search. However, nothing suspicious was found. Officials added that they have launched an investigation to trace the caller.