The Indian national is alleged to have created the fake terror plot so that he wouldn’t have to go on the trip to Goa and Mumbai with a woman he met on a dating website.

The suspect, who is married with a child, reportedly did not have the money to take the woman on the holiday and was “too proud to say so”, leading to him concocting the story.

Instead, he sent his girlfriend a fake plane ticket and then tried to get the flight cancelled by emailing details of a fake hijacking plot to Mumbai police, CNN reports.

In his email, which was released in a statement by police in Hyderabad, he claimed to be a woman who had overheard six men plotting to hijack planes in Hyderabad, Chennai and Mumbai the following day.

The email was taken seriously by authorities and resulted in security being increased by the airports it concerned.

Officers were able to trace the email back to the travel consultant through the IP address which came from an internet cafe called E Netzone in Hyderabad and laster used CCTV footage to confirmed that he was the one who sent the email.

CNN reports that he confessed to the hoax during police questioning.

B. Limba Reddy, deputy commissioner of police at the Commissioner’s Task Force in Hyderabad, is reported to have said at a press conference: "He didn’t have the money, but if he cancelled because of that, it would have hurt his pride, and his friendship with the girl would’ve come to an end.

“So, his thinking was that if the flight was to be cancelled and it was because of the airport, he wouldn’t be at fault."

The man was arrested on four charges, including impersonation and providing false information.