Across the city, many worried citizens cancelled their weekend plans following a “high alert” over a possible terror threat after a memo from the Police Commissioner’s office on security measures to be taken was leaked. Many people got calls from their concerned relatives in other parts of the country asking them to “take care”.
“After receiving a WhatsApp forward of the Police Commissioner’s memo on ‘high alert’ in the city, we were apprehensive of stepping out of home,” said Surabhi Subramaniam who lives in Jalahalli.
Regional TV news channels started airing stories on terror conspiracies, not just in Bengaluru but across Karnataka, creating a fear psychosis in the city. Senior police officials termed the “terror” reports as speculative and said there was no threat to public safety.
Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao said the memo was an internal communication on keeping the city safe and it was not for public domain. “A leak from the commissionerate has created this panic. I have ordered a probe into the source of the leak,” he said.
‘No specific alert’
Sources in the Karnataka State police said senior officials were upset by the “an unprofessional leak”. “Firstly, there is no State or city-specific security alert at all. The Bengaluru Police Commissioner’s memo emerged out of a nationwide security alert over a possible terror attack during the Independence Day week. All metros and installations across the country are under alert, not just Bengaluru,” a senior police official. He added that as the memo was leaked and was shared widely on WhatsApp and social media, it is being projected as if there is a specific threat to Karnataka and Bengaluru, which is false.
The former State intelligence chief Gopal B. Hosur said the memo should not have been made public. “What is most important is to not create panic, the exact opposite of what happened in this instance,” he said.
Another senior official in the city was concerned that the fear psychosis may result in untoward incidents. “What if someone is mistaken as a terrorist and lynched?” he said.
A security review meeting by the then Police Commissioner in May 2019, following the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka, triggered a similar panic in the city. A man who walked out of Majestic metro station after he was asked to stand aside when the door-frame metal detector beeped, was branded a “terror suspect on the loose in the city” by a section of the media. Eventually, the man was tracked down and the police learned that he was a labourer from Rajasthan who had never taken a metro ride before.
‘Digital solution’
According to Tobby Simon, founder and president, Synergia Foundation, a think tank on counter-terrorism and strategic affairs, such messages only instil fear in communities and slows down normal life. “In this case, what we noticed is that subsequent notifications by the State police had little impact and the first news about the terrorist threat had already spread like a wildfire. A digital problem needs a digital solution. Law enforcing authorities must be vigilant and work with residents’ welfare associations to counter the spread of fake and deep fake news in real time,” he said.
