The UK Airprox Board said the near-miss took place on 21 June, as the pilot of a twin engine Diamond DA42 Twin Star was about to practice landing at Cranfield Airport near Milton Keynes.

As it began descending, the pilot said they saw a red DeltaJet microlight pass about 100ft-200ft (30m-61m) underneath them.

The report concluded that although both pilots shared responsibility for avoiding a collision, the pilot of the DeltaJet could have warned air traffic control it was in the area.

The microlight pilot had planned to fly over central Milton Keynes, but the route seemed more built-up than they had envisaged, and decided to divert around the edge of the city – the report said.

The Airprox Board heard that although the DA42 had been fitted with a traffic alert system, it had not detected the presence of the microlight.

The pilot of the DeltaJet said they were unaware of the near-miss until they received a notice of the investigation, while the DA42 pilot spotted the microlight aircraft after it passed underneath.

It was close enough that they could tell the DeltaJet pilot was wearing a lightly-coloured t-shirt.

“[The board] agreed that the separation between the DA42 and the Deltajet had been such that safety had been much reduced and that there had been a risk of collision,” the report said.

The recent threats were all hoaxes, Mr Mohol said, with “no actual threat detected at any of the airports/aircraft in India”.Police have registered 256 complaints and 12 people have been arrested in connection with these threats, the minister said.But the cases mark an unprecedented spike in such hoaxes.Between 2014 and 2017, authorities had recorded just 120 bomb hoax alerts at airports, with nearly half directed at Delhi and Mumbai, the country’s largest airports.The flurry of hoax threats this October had delayed several affected flights while others were diverted.Hoax threats against flights heading for other countries also lead to international agencies getting involved.In October, Singapore’s Air Force sent two fighter jets to escort an Air India Express plane following a bomb threat.The same month, another Air India flight from New Delhi to Chicago was forced to land in a remote airport in Canada.Passengers on the flight were later airlifted to Chicago on an Air Force plane deployed by Canadian officials.India’s civil aviation ministry had then said it was making “every possible effort” to safeguard flight operations.India’s airports have a Bomb Threat Assessment Committee which assesses the gravity of the threat and takes action accordingly. A threat can lead to the involvement of the bomb disposal squad, sniffer dogs, ambulances, police and doctors.Passengers are off-loaded from the plane along with cabin baggage, check-in baggage and cargo, and they are all screened again. Engineering and security teams also search the plane before it is cleared for flying again.The resultant delay can cost thousands of dollars in damages to airlines and security agencies.More than 150 million passengers flew domestically in India last year, according to the civil aviation ministry.More than 3,000 flights arrive and depart every day in the country from more than 150 operational airports, including 33 international airports.