Kerala: Man held for planting 'bomb' in aircraft

Discounting any terror link, the Kerala police on Sunday took a man into custody for allegedly planting crude explosive material in the cargo-hold of a Kingfisher aircraft here last week in order to implicate security personnel.

The man, a contract ground-handling employee at the airport, was taken into custody two days ago and he confessed to the crime during interrogation, police said.

The arrest of the suspect, hailing from Kattakkada about 20 km from Thiruvananthapuram, would be recorded later in the day.

The explosive material, a mixture of potassium chloride, ammonia and sulphur,was found in the cargo hold of Kingfisher flight after it arrived here from Bangalore last Sunday.

The vital clue in the investigation was obtained from the papers used to wrap the combustible substance of the size of a cricket ball, sources said.

The inner layer of the wrapping comprised a question paper of a school examination conducted here last year and the outer layer was part of a local edition of a Malayalam newspaper.

Police have questioned about 100 persons as part of the investigations. The probe team led by City Police Commissioner M R Ajith Kumar visited Bangalore airport in search of clues.

However, right from the start the probe focussed on the assumption that the material could have been planted before the flight's departure to Bangalore after a gap of 30 minutes on arrival here, sources said.