NEW DELHI, Dec 16: India’s parliament was evacuated on Friday after intelligence authorities received warnings of a bomb attack that turned out to be a hoax. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was moved to a secure government building nearby when the alert was sounded about noon.

Both houses of parliament were in session at the time. They resumed the session after the premises were swept.

Members of parliament and their staff were ordered to leave after an e-mail warning was received by India’s intelligence agency and the US embassy, Home Minister Shivraj Patil said.

“The message said that at 11.45am (1115am PST), the Indian parliament will be blown up,” Patil told lawmakers of both houses after parliament reconvened in mid-afternoon.

“Though we have received such information before, we decided not to take any chances and took appropriate action,” he said.

Hundreds of security personnel scoured the sprawling complex twice with sniffer dogs and explosive detection equipment before MPs were given the all-clear to return, Patil said.

“The police and bomb squads said it (the parliament complex) was clean,” Patil told lawmakers.

Both houses had adjourned “after intelligence agencies received a tip-off about some definite information about outfits planning to have bomb blasts,” said Anand Sharma, spokesman for the ruling Congress party, earlier in the day.

The scare came just over four years after rebel militants staged a deadly raid on India’s parliament that New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-backed rebels. Pakistan denied any involvement in the attack, which brought the nuclear-armed nations close to a fourth war.

After the bomb alert on Friday Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was in parliament, was whisked away by security men to his office about a kilometre away.

Security forces threw up barricades around parliament as commandos, soldiers and police with guns drawn surrounded the complex. MPs raced out in cars with sirens wailing.

Security was also tightened at the nearby presidential palace and at the South and North Blocks housing the main government offices.

Patil said information about the bomb threat came in an e-mail from the southern city of Chennai and the place from where it came had been “tracked”.

“Question hour was on when an official came in and informed him (the Speaker) of some bomb scare...immediately the Speaker adjourned the house,” Congress party member Pawan Kumar Bansal said.

“We were told the parliament building has to be evacuated,” Bansal said.

Security fears have grown since bomb blasts shook New Delhi in late October on the eve of India’s biggest Hindu festival, killing 66 people and injuring 220.

Police blamed the blasts on a Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-i-Toiba fighting New Delhi’s rule in held Kashmir.

Pakistan, which now is engaged in a slow-moving peace process with India, condemned the October blasts.—Agencies