Rail Minister indifferent - Leave Passengers Unsafe

Tourists thrashed on train again Falguni Banerjee TNN 13.11.11 Bandel (Hooghly): In yet another example of how unsafe train travel has become, a group of tourists from Bengal was thrashed and abused on the Howrah-bound Bagh Express as it was passing through Uttar Pradesh on Friday morning.      Two children and a woman were injured in the incident.      The tourists, travelling with reserved tickets on a sleeper-class compartment, claimed that there were no security personnel on board when  they came under attack from a group of hoodlums. Railway staff refused to provide any assistance till the train reached Siwan in Bihar, the tourists claimed.      The passengers reached Bandel on Saturday and lodged a complaint with GRP. Eastern Railway officials said the incident occurred before the train entered their jurisdiction. “If we receive a complaint, we shall forward it to those concerned,” an official said.  TRAIN TERROR October 2011: Passengers on Trivandrum-Guwahati Exp complain their berths are taken over by others.  The same month, passengers on UP Darjeeling Mail are looted by goons, who tamper signal to stop train and walk away with loot. No cops on train There were no guards on board  Bandel: Sixty-odd tourists, including women and children, from Kolkata, Hooghly, North and South 24-Parganas, boarded the train from Kathgodam on Thursday. All of them had been allotted berths in coach S7. Around 11am on Friday, when the train was near Khalilabad in UP, 7-8 youngsters entered their compartment and started harassing the women.      “They first asked the women to make space for them on their berths. When the women protested, they started passing lewd remarks and clicking photographs. When the men in the group protested, they were thrashed.      When Manasi Ghosh, a tourist in her 60s, protested, she was pushed so hard that she fell down.      This continued for about three hours but no railway securityman came to their rescue. There were no security personnel on board to whom the tourists could turn to. The tormentors finally got off when the train slowed down outside Nunkhar station in UP. But this was not the end of the ordeal. As the train passed the station (it doesn’t stop there), the miscreants threw stones at the compartment.      “Two children were injured in their hands and a woman received a gash under her eye. There was no doctor on board and we received no assistance when the train stopped at Bhatni Junction (the next station after Nunkhar). We requested train staff to arrange for some food and water, for us but they abused us in return.