Maharashtra: Now, gelatin sticks found on railway tracks

On Thursday, a trackman informed officials about four discarded gelatin sticks being found between the rail tracks on the Diva-Panvel track of the Konkan Railway. As the sticks appeared to be old, and since no detonator was found, the police said it could be an act of mischief aimed at creating panic.

“We have initiated an inquiry of junior railway staff including track men and gang men. The gang men and track supervisors posted at night are being interrogated to understand if it is a case of mischief on their part. Their Call Data Records are also being traced,” said a senior railway security official.

Sources said that while there have been four incidents of attempted sabotage of railway tracks, the objects used have been different. “In every case a different object has been used thus in terms of the object we don’t find a pattern to it. However, three incidents have happened in Navi Mumbai and one near Diva station and in all the four cases the incident spots are isolated and not under CCTV cover,” said the official.

The Navi Mumbai Police have registered a case against an unknown person at Taloja Police station under the Railways Act. Hemant Nagrale, the Navi Mumbai Police chief, told The Indian Express that “The sticks are very old and looks like discarded ones and may not be live ammunition. No detonator was attached to it so there was no possibility of any explosion. It looks like mischief on part of the accused to create a scare. This is the third incidence of such nature on the railway track in the last few days in Navi Mumbai area. Regular patrolling of tracks is being done by all concerned departments”.

Even the RPF is treating the case as an act of mischief and are sceptical of any terror angle. “The gelatin sticks were small but they were wrapped in a paper with ‘Explosive Class’ written on it. We suspect that the miscreants did so to create panic. As of now we don’t suspect there is terror angle,” a Railway Police Force (RPF) official said.

On January 24, the 12052 Jan Shatabdi Express started from Madgaon in Goa at 2.30 pm and was to reach Mumbai at around 11 pm. At around 10.20 pm, loco pilot Harendra Kumar and assistant Harish Chinchole noticed something glittering on the track between Diva and Mumbra railway stations. Kumar immediately applied the emergency brakes and brought the train to a grinding halt. The train was running late by 15 minutes with nearly 700 passengers on board. The object was found to be a metallic bar.

On Monday night, the motorman of the Pune-Santragachi Express, which was coming from Pune, did not notice a metal bar in the dark, and the locomotive hit it. Subsequently, a 1.5 metre piece of rail was found on the track in the Navi Mumbai node on Monday night.

On Wednesday, 2.5 meters iron rod, ripped off from one of railway’s electrical equipment, was found partly lying on tracks near Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT).

“We have increased patrolling near the suspected areas to detect any suspicious movement and trace the cause. This is in continuation of the efforts to remove all rail pieces and any other objects near the track,” said AK Shrivastava, Chief Security Commissioner, Central Railway.

Railway officials have also hinted at a shortage of railway employees and staff to man the larger section of railways. The only reasonable solution could be to track the culprits and end this occurrence, they said. “An increase in patrolling or more surveillance would not prove to be the sole solution in putting a stop to this. The solution lies in ending this by punishing the culprits at the earliest. We have also asked the concerned departments and RPF to supervise their respective divisions carefully,” said GC Agarwal, General Manager, Western Railway.

On Wednesday, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu expressed concern over the rise in incidents of sabotage behind rail accidents in the country. Responding to a supplementary in the Lok Sabha during question hour, he said that 68 such incidents have come to light in the past few months.