Low attendance in Delhi schools day after bomb scare; principals revisit evacuation plans for future

New Delhi schools face lower attendance after hoax bomb threats, principals revisit evacuation plans for future emergencies.

A day after around 200 schools received hoax bomb emails, educational institutions in New Delhi witnessed a slightly lower attendance, even as principals revisited evacuation plans for such emergencies in the future.

Around 200 schools in Delhi-NCR Wednesday morning received a hoax bomb threat via email which led to widespread panic among parents and students, prompting authorities to suspend classes and ask parents to pick their wards from the school.

Many schools on Thursday reopened to normalcy but attendance has taken a hit even in schools where the threat was not received, principals of some schools said.

Jyoti Arora, principal of Mount Abu School, said she revisited the school's evacuation plan on each floor and also wrote to disaster management authorities to conduct mock drills and awareness activities for them.

She said that there was "slightly more absenteeism" than usual on Thursday.

"I wrote an email to parents telling them to counsel their children and in case they need help from school counsellors, they are also available. I also requested parents to assess their reaction in case of such situations," Ms. Arora said.

She said some parents were pushing the gates and some were insisting on taking their children out of turn. "I told them, 'I have 2,700 children to take care of'," she told PTI.