'I am with Taliban': Indian-origin man acquitted after joke about blowing up a plane

The message Aditya Verma sent to friends before boarding the plane went on to be picked up by UK security services. (Representational image)

A Spanish court acquitted a British-Indian man of public disorder after he joked to friends about being a member of the Taliban and planning to blow up a flight from London's Gatwick to Menorca in Spain in 2022.

Aditya Verma admitted to telling his friends in July 2022: "On my way to blow up the plane. I'm a member of the Taliban." He, however, said he had made the joke in a private Snapchat group and never intended to "cause public distress", the BBC reported.

Verma claimed that calling himself Taliban was an inside joke. “I was called a Taliban at school because of my features and I used to joke about it and I know the Taliban is considered to be a terrorist group,” he told the Madrid court last week. “But I didn't think it was going to cause people on the flight to be afraid because it was sent to a private friends' group and wasn't meant for them.”

The judge ruled on Friday that "no explosive... was found that would lead one to believe it was a real threat".

The judge at the trial, held at the National Court in the Spanish capital, on Monday - a year-and-a-half after the incident took place -- ruled that Verma should be cleared of any wrongdoing.

The message he sent to friends before boarding the plane went on to be picked up by UK security services. They then flagged it to Spanish authorities while the easyJet plane was still in the air.

Two Spanish F-18 fighter jets were sent to flank the aircraft. One followed the plane until it landed at Menorca, where the plane was searched.

Verma, who was 18 at the time, was arrested and held in a Spanish police cell for two days. He was later released on bail.

If he had been found guilty, the university student faced a fine of up to 22,500 euros (about Rs 20 lakh) and a further 95,000 euros (about Rs 86 lakh) in expenses to cover the cost of the jets being scrambled.

Read more: Taliban official says women lose value if their faces are visible to men in public