On Friday morning, Radhika D. S., whose three children study at Neev Academy, Yamalur, received a call from the school asking her to collect her daughter. By then, she was aware that something was amiss. While her eldest child, a Class IX student, was physically attending school, her two younger children were taking online classes from home.
“First, the teacher in the online class went offline and within minutes, I got a message that classes had been suspended for the day. Before we could even consider what triggered this, I got an email from the school saying that there was an active COVID-19 case reported on the premises. Parents were asked to collect their children immediately,” she said.
When Ms. Radhika rushed to the school, she found it crawling with police personnel. “The police were all over the place. We were told there was a fire drill under way, It was only after we returned home that we learned from media reports about the bomb threat,” she recounted. Incidentally, a COVID-19 case was also reported at the school that day.
Initially, there were reports of eight schools receiving threats, but as the day progressed the number increased to 15 as more school managements checked their emails.
Students asked to leave classrooms
At Neev Academy, Ms. Radhika said her daughter and her classmates were asked to report to the quadrangle mid-way during class. They were instructed to leave all their belongings behind to participate in a fire drill. From the quadrangle, they were sent home with their parents. They have to return to school to collect their belongings over the weekend.
Children in other schools that received bomb threat recounted similar experiences. A Class VIII student from St. Vincent Pallotti School, Hennur, told the media that they were asked to leave the school during the lunch break. They were unaware of what had happened.
Allen, a parent of a student from one of the schools that received the email bomb threat, saw reports on media and rushed to the school .“I saw there was a bomb threat and immediately went to pick up my daughter. There was no clarity on what was happening,” he told journalists.
Scenes at most other schools were similar. Manila Carvalho, principal, Delhi Public School, Bengaluru East, which also received the threat email, said they immediately suspended classes and informed parents of an emergency situation.
An email was sent out asking parents to report to school and collect their children. “We did not want to alarm them and create panic,” she said. “There were parents who had come for admission, and others who had come to drop off their kids for summer camps. We did not disclose the threat email we received, but evacuated everyone,” she added.
Exams disrupted
Some of the schools were conducting their annual exams and students were asked to leave the classrooms mid-way. “A few schools also had their annual school exams going on, and were mostly disrupted,” said D. Shashikumar, general secretary, Associated Managements of Private Schools in Karnataka.
Many schools, even those that did not receive emails, voluntarily shut down in panic. “We knew these were hoax threats, but we can take no chances when it comes to children’s safety. There was panic among school managements, but the situation improved by afternoon when the police searched all schools and declared them safe,” he added.
