RPF hang up, when woman informs them about suspicious bag in train

Mumbai: Railway Police Force (RPF) hung up 8 times when Swati Sharma-who was on board a local-called them to inform about an unattended bag in the train. Sharma has alleged that the Mumbai police refused to take action after she raised an alarm about a suspicious bag in the local train she was travelling in.

She had called RPF 8 times, while she travelled in the local from Andheri on 19 July.
“I noticed a bag lying on the overhead rack and looked around, there were only three people in the coach. I had a bad feeling about it. I asked the other passengers if the bag was theirs, but they refused,” she told the Mid-Day.

The first call was answered by a woman who disconnected it after asking Sharma for the details of the bag and the compartment she was in, Sharma said. Someone answered the eighth call and asked her a few questions. On reaching her destination, Churchgate station, she spoke to the police officers at the station, but they too did not help.

“I finally managed to catch the attention of a helpful cop called Jadhav, who sprung into action, but by then the train had left the station.” However, when he finally arrived, he simply had one question for her: Are you happy with our customer care?

She says that she later received several calls from the same official asking for her details. “This is exactly why people don’t complain to the authorities in the first place. I was surprised that all the way from Bandra – where I made the first call to the helpline – to Churchgate, no one came to help. I felt so embarrassed that despite being an aware citizen, I was unable to get any help. Help should be on hand at every station, and easily accessible, but I could not find anyone. Next time this happens, I’m just going to get off the train,” she told.

When Mid-Day reached out to the police, Anup Shukla, senior divisional security commissioner for the Western Railway, replied with: “I am not authorised to comment on any issue. Please speak to my DIG about it.”

When they called up Railway Security Helpline, a woman officer answered and said that the helpline was working fine on 19 July and it was the routine procedure to ask for the details of the caller.