Accused gets 20 years for planting explosive at city airport
The Hindu
Aditya Rao pleaded guilty on July 30, 2021 when produced before court through video conferencing
Fourth Additional District and Sessions Judge B.R. Pallavi on Wednesday sentenced 37-year-old Aditya Rao to 20 years in jail on finding him guilty of placing an explosive substance at the international airport here about two years ago.
The judge sentenced Rao to 20 years rigorous imprisonment and imposed a fine of ₹10,000 on him for an offence punishable under Section 16 (b) of Unlawful Activities Prevention Act. He was also sentenced to five years of rigorous imprisonment and asked to pay a fine of ₹10,000 for an offence punishable under Section 4 of the Explosive Substances Act. Both sentences will run concurrently, the judge said.
The case relates to placing an improvised explosive in a black bag on a steel chair near the departure gate of the airport on the morning of January 20, 2020.
After the airport control room received a message, Inspector of the Central Industrial Security Force Manas Nayak went to the spot along with a quick response team. Upon finding it to be an explosive substance, the Bajpe Police was informed.
Bajpe Police registered a case and then arrangements were made to safely remove it to an open place, a kilometre away from the airport, where it was defused.
A team of officers analysed CCTV footage and other available evidence were gathered to find that Rao, a former staffer of a popular restaurant near Ambedkar Circle here, had placed the substance in the airport. He was arrested after he surrendered at the office of the Director-General and Inspector-General of Police, Bengaluru, on January 22, 2020.
Rao had undergone one year imprisonment in Chikkaballapur Jail for making a hoax call about a bomb in the Bengaluru airport soon after he failed to get selected for the post of security officer at the airport in 2018. In anger, Rao had searched the internet to find a way to make explosives. He ordered Potassium Nitrate and Sodium online.
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