Man makes hoax call, blames it on wife's paramour

Just when revellers were ushering in the New Year, the police control room here received an anonymous call which said a bomb had been planted at the upmarket MG Road and that it would go off any moment.

The police traced the caller to Mumbai and arrested him recently. Devendra Natavar Lal, 40, had spoken to the police control room in Hindi and given his name as Munna. Only, Munna is the man with whom his wife had eloped.

Natavar told the police he wanted to put Munna, who reportedly lives in Bengaluru, in trouble.

After the call, the control room officers alerted the police top brass. An anti-sabotage team and dog squad were then pressed into service. After a thorough check, it turned out to be a hoax call.

The police then began tracking the mobile phone number from which the threat call was made.

The number was traced to the Kurla locality in Mumbai. The Bengaluru police, along with the Kurla police, tracked Natavar down.

A senior police officer said, “When we questioned him why he made such a threat, he said his wife had eloped with a man named Munna and was living in Bengaluru. To put that person in trouble, he made the threat call and identified himself as Munna. He seems to be mentally disturbed.”