Kolkata, Oct 17 (IANS): The Ministry of Railways is giving a serious thought to the redeployment of Railway Protection Force (RPF) commandos on premier trains like Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto passing along certain routes after Sunday's armed robbery on board the New Delhi-Howrah Duronto Express in Bihar.
This train was supposed to be escorted by armed contingents of the Government Railway Police (GRP) at night. Passengers, however, complained that the GRP parties got off at Patna station where the train reached around 1 a.m. on Sunday.
As many as 20 armed robbers got on the train soon after it left Patna station on its way to Howrah and looted belongings of the passengers in 7-8 coaches at gunpoint. Many passengers staged a demonstration at Howrah station after the train reached its destination, demanding better protection.
"It was extremely scary. The criminals pointed guns at the passengers and looted whatever they could lay their hands on. If this can happen on a Duronto Express, what of other trains? People pay a lot for tickets on such trains and deserve adequate protection. The railways claims law-and-order is the state governments' duty, but the states maintain they don't have adequate manpower. Why should the passengers suffer due to all this," a passenger said after alighting in Howrah.
According to a senior official in the Railway Board, the matter has been taken up seriously and discussions have begun on whether special RPF teams can be deployed end-to-end on such trains passing through certain states. Reports have been sought from senior RPF officials of East Central Railway. At one time, the New Delhi-bound Rajdhani Expresses from Howrah and Sealdah that passed through Bihar, used to be escorted by RPF commandos. No untoward incident was reported when such escort was provided. The commandos were withdrawn after Nitish Kumar took over as chief minister of Bihar and the law-and-order situation improved.
A legislator in Bihar, however, said that there is no need for a knee jerk reaction. "All efforts are being made to track down the gang involved. We also suspect that this could be a political conspiracy to tarnish the image of the JD(U)-RJD coalition that is in power in Bihar at the moment," he said.