Mumbai police help sought in unclaimed bag case

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD, AUG. 17. A carry bag abandoned by a Mumbai-bound passenger at the departure lounge of the airport on Thursday morning created a commotion, with the bomb disposal squad identifying that vapours of some highgrade explosives like the TNT and PETN were emanating from it.

On finding that the bag contained only some soiled diapers, the city police officials asked their counterparts in Mumbai to intercept a woman passenger, who was travelling with a one-year- old child, on the assumption that she could have left the bag behind.

However, the woman, who was flown back to Hyderabad for questioning on Friday, maintained that the bag did not belong to her. It was possible that it belonged to another passenger who was travelling with a child on the same plane. The woman had been let off and a search has commenced for the other passenger described as a `burly man'.

According to the Commissioner of Police, Mr. P. Ramulu, a search was now on to locate the `burly man', who appeared like a Pakistani, travelling along with a child and a crippled woman. Police were trying to find out more details about the `burly man'.

The police who collected a list of passengers who flew in the Mumbai-bound flight, were trying to ascertain where the `burly man' hailed from and which travel agency had issued tickets to him from Hyderabad. There were strong suspicions that the `burly man' could have delivered a consignment of high explosives. It was being reasoned that the bag must have been kept along with the explosives or was used for carrying explosives and hence vapours of TNT and PETN were emanating from it.

The Commissioner said that the unclaimed bag lying in the departure lounge was noticed by the CISF personnel manning the airport. On being alerted, the City Security Wing officials rushed there with a sniffer dog and some electronic equipment to detect explosives. Initially, water was poured on the bag and the dog allowed to sniff.

When the dog sat on the bag (sniffer dogs are trained to sit on the containers in which it smells explosives), the electronic equipment was used. This equipment indicated that vapours of high explosives, which could possibly be TNT or PETN, were emanating from it. The bag was immediately opened and the police could only find six soiled diapers.

``Our suspicions immediately centred around passengers travelling with children and the woman was picked up in Mumbai. She was very cooperative with the police,'' Mr. Ramulu added. It was stated that the Mumbai police had been alerted to look out for the `burly man'.

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