Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru
Bengaluru, Sep 8: A software engineer from Kerala Gokul Macheri, has been booked for making false bomb threat calls to the manager at Kempegowda Airport Bengaluru claiming that three flights out of the city had bombs on them. That isn't all he did - he blackmailed his own wife about her affair with a student, he killed her, then placed the bomb threat calls to implicate the husband of his girlfriend. All of his efforts were focused on having a life with his old girlfriend who was currently his neighbour in Bengaluru.
Gokul (35) had met and fallen in love with a girl when he was doing engineering in Thrissur. Due to caste issues, their families did not allow them to marry and Gokul soon went to Delhi for his job. He met and married a girl named Anuradha in Delhi. The two even had a child and life was going on quite smoothly till he re-connected with his ex-girlfriend on the social networking site Facebook. She too was going through a rough marriage and was more than happy to re-connect with Gokul. When he came to know that she was in Bengaluru, Gokul shifted his whole family to the same apartment where his ex-girlfriend lived. His own wife Anuradha was clueless in the whole matter. Anuradha took up a teaching job and soon was entrenched in an affair with her own student.
Gokul who came to know of his wife's affair posed as a 'Baba' (Godman) and threatened her via e-mail. He asked her to send a photo of the two of them together so he could bless their union. Anuradha soon emailed 'Baba' a photograph of her boyfriend and herself. Armed with this, Gokul got her drunk one night and killed her. The case was proclaimed as an unnatural death by Police as they had to take into consideration the ongoing affair that Anuradha had with her student based on the picture produced by Gokul.
With his wife out of the way - Gokul began working on eliminating his girlfriend's husband so the two of them could live happily ever after. Gokul bought a SIM in the name of the husband of his girlfriend with a view to send him to jail. He then sent three messages to the manager of the Kempegowda airport claiming that three international flights flying out of the airport had bombs on them. His messages, spoke of the Jet Airways flight to Hong Kong - 9W078, Swiss Air to Zurich - LX147, Cathay Pacific flight to Hong Kong - CX694. Some of his messages, made in the name of the dreaded ISIS, reportedly read as 'Islamic State Wins. Air France to Paris and Haj Flight to Jeddah will be blasted on air', 'Third target for today - Lufthansa to Germany', 'Get ready to see fireworks in the sky today', 'Three bombs kept at Airport Cargo sector are ready to blast at 3am, IS wins', 'You can't trace any of our men, at least trace the bomb', and 'Not for today. It will be tomorrow at 3 am'.
When the police traced the calls and arrested him, he confessed it all, even telling the police that he had in fact killed his own wife. His girlfriend on the other hand has taken on the responsibility to bring up Gokul's daughter along with two of her own, as she believes he is a 'hero'. She seemed to find no fault with him for he did all of it to win her back.
Gokul also made a call to the chairman of Airtel, Sunil Bharti Mittal, threatening to kill him if he fails to pay one crore rupees. This call was made after the call to the airports in the city and New Delhi. As the call to Mittal was not received, he sent a message in the name of Shaju Jose, husband of his friend, duly providing the bank account number to which the said sum was to be credited. A complaint based on this message stands filed in a police station in New Delhi, it is learnt.
Based on the message sent by Gokul, an Air France flight that had left the international airport here an hour back, had to be recalled, and scheduled departure of certain flights had to be cancelled as the threat was specific in nature. Gokul has been booked under section 3 (1) D of the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against Safety of Civil Aviation Act, 1982, under which provision to award life imprisonment exists.
Police commissioner Megharikh said that the authorities have estimated the financial loss caused in the fake bomb call made on Saturday to be around Rs 8 crore.
The police commissioner said that the gadgets used by Gokul are being analyzed by forensic experts of cyber forensic science laboratory here. All the cases against Gokul would be handled by the city crime branch, he added.
The collateral damage in Gokul's love rampage however is his little child and Jose - the husband of Gokul's girlfriend - both of whom have lost their whole families through no fault of their own.