A defused grenade found on Friday night in the business class of an Air India jumbo aircraft kept as standby for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent US visit, could have been the remnant of an anti-terror drill.
The grenade was found by the Air India crew on board the Boeing 747-400 which was operating the Mumbai-Hyderabad-Jeddah flight, airline sources said. On landing at Jeddah, the incident was reported to the local security agencies who took over the aircraft, sources said.
An AI executive said that it was the “plastic casing” of a shell of a stun grenade used by security during the anti terror drills carried out in the plane and that it was “completely harmless”. The airline is carrying out its investigations and the aircraft has been held back at Jeddah despite being cleared by airport security.
The plane is likely to return to Calicut soon.
The aircraft had been kept as a standby for the recent US visit of Modi. The Prime Minister had undertaken a five-day visit to the US from September 25.
