No explosives found in bags after bomb scares at Mirpur-10, Farmgate metro stations

No explosives were found in suspicious bags recovered from Mirpur-10 and Farmgate metro stations in Dhaka today (1 August) after bomb disposal personnel examined both items, police have said.

Earlier, at around 11am, MRT police spotted a sack on top of a passenger entry and exit sign beneath Farmgate station and informed the local police.

Officers cordoned off the area and alerted the Dhaka Metropolitan Police's bomb disposal unit.

After examining the sack, the bomb disposal team found nothing inside.

DMP Tejgaon Division Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (ADC) Fazlul Karim told The Business Standard that the sack was empty and had been left on top of the passenger entry and exit sign beneath the metro station.

At around 12:45pm, MRT police found a shopping bag containing what appeared to be a bomb-like object beside Gate B of Mirpur-10 station. 

Mirpur Model Police Station officers reached the scene and informed the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit's bomb disposal team.

Mirpur Model Police Station Officer-in-Charge Hafizur Rahman later said the bomb disposal unit informed police that no explosives were found inside the bag. 

He added that police were not immediately informed what the bag contained.

In a later statement, the DMP said the objects found beneath the Mirpur-10 and Farmgate metro stations were not explosives and urged the public not to panic.

It added that reports of the two abandoned "bomb-like objects" found beneath the metro stations this morning had caused temporary public concern. 

Police from the respective stations, senior officers and the CTTC bomb disposal team quickly reached the scenes and strengthened security measures, the DMP said.

At Mirpur-10, the bomb disposal unit examined the suspicious bag using an X-ray scanner and detected the image of a can-like object inside. 

Following standard operating procedures, the team used a frangible disruptor to safely neutralise the object before opening the bag.

The bag was later found to contain a tin of zarda and betel leaf. No explosives or other harmful materials were found.

The incidents come after police recovered a powerful pressure cooker bomb from a bag outside a tea stall in the Charabag Khejur Bagan area of Ashulia at around 10:30pm on Thursday (30 July). 

The bomb was later neutralised in a controlled explosion in a nearby open field early yesterday.

Before that, at around 6pm on 24 July, police recovered an improvised explosive device (IED) from inside an abandoned umbrella beneath Motijheel Metro Station. 

The device had a flashing red light and was making sounds when it was found as a Hindu religious procession marking Ulto Rath Yatra was passing through the area with hundreds of participants.

The DMP bomb disposal unit later defused the IED at around 7pm. 

During the operation, passer-by Miraj Ahmed, 33, sustained an injury to his left eye.