In Brief 8212; Pune

Automen lay siege to police station for five hoursPune: An irate mob of six-seater autorickshaw drivers gheraoed the Yerawada police stat...

Automen lay siege to police station for five hours
Pune: An irate mob of six-seater autorickshaw drivers gheraoed the Yerawada police station for almost five hours over the alleged manhandling of one of their colleagues by a traffic police constable near Chandanagar dargah on the Pune-Ahmednagar Road on Saturday.

Irked over the incident nearly a thousand people rushed to the police station and disrupted traffic before the senior police officer reached the spot and controlled the situation. A delegation of the agitating drivers also met the senior police officials including deputy commissioner of police Himmatrao Deshbhratar and demanded immediate action against the constable involved in the incident.

The agitating crowd blocked the road to disrupt traffic for nearly half an hour before the police officials reached the spot. The drivers complained that Shivaji Maruti Gadwane 21 was on his way to Pune railway station when the traffic constable B S Shinde signalled him to stop which, they claimed, the former failed to notice. Shinde, they claimed, cornered him near the dargah and started manhandling him.

According to Bhagwan Hari Chavan, a rickshaw driver who was witness to the incident: 8220;We intervened and took Gadwane home. Later when his condition deteriorated we took him to the hospital.8221;

According to senior police officials present at the police station, Gadwane had been sent to Sassoon Hospital for examination. 8220;We are still looking into the matter,8221; said assistant commissioner of police, Sahshikant Mahavarkar. 8220;DCP Deshbhratar has promised an inquiry and we will take appropriate action when the facts are established,8221; he said.

Robbery on train
Pune: A gang of robbers entered the Hyderabad-bound Hussain Sagar Express near Karjat and decamped with cash and valuables totalling to Rs 61,950 in the early hours of Saturday.

According to a complaint by Abdul Qadir 39, a resident of Secunderabad, armed robbers entered their compartment when the passengers were fast asleep. They robbed the travellers and got off the train as it moved out of Lonavla.