Gujarat assembly evacuated after hoax bomb threat email during budget session

A bomb threat email triggered a security scare at the Gujarat Legislative Assembly on Wednesday morning, just minutes before the ongoing budget session was set to begin at 9 am. The message, received around 8:45 am, claimed explosives had been planted inside the complex, prompting an immediate evacuation of MLAs, staff and visitors.

Police, along with the Bomb Detection and Disposal Squad , dog units and other security agencies, carried out a detailed search of the premises under the supervision of senior officers. After nearly an hour of checks, officials confirmed that no suspicious object had been found and declared the threat a hoax , allowing proceedings to resume with a delay.

Speaker Shankar Chaudhary later assured the House that the premises had been thoroughly sanitised and that strict action would be taken against those responsible. Lawmakers across party lines expressed concern over the rising frequency of such incidents.

Recent data underscores the scale of the problem. In February 2026 alone, at least 34 schools in Ahmedabad and Vadodara received similar bomb threat emails, all later declared hoaxes after evacuations and searches. Earlier waves saw over 40 schools across Gujarat targeted in a single day, reflecting how coordinated such threats have become.

Nationally, the pattern is even more striking. Government data shows 881 hoax bomb threats were reported in India’s aviation sector between 2022 and mid-2025, with a sharp spike of 728 cases in 2024 alone . Meanwhile, Karnataka recorded 468 hoax threats between 2020 and early 2026 , with only a handful of cases solved, highlighting the difficulty of tracing perpetrators.

Investigations suggest many such emails are routed through VPNs or overseas servers, complicating identification. In some cases, minors have been traced as senders, but most remain anonymous, turning these incidents into a persistent security challenge .

Despite being labelled as hoaxes, each alert triggers a full emergency response, evacuations, bomb squad deployment and disruption of public life. The Gujarat Assembly incident underscores how such threats have expanded from schools and courts to critical institutions of governance. No explosives were found on Wednesday, but the disruption reflects a growing and measurable strain on India’s security apparatus.