Two attacked with knife in train for denying access to mobile charging

Representational pic

In the age of mobile phone obsession, the constant need for a mobile phone charging port is no surprise. The battle to secure one is unending. However, one such battle escalated to unimaginable levels in an Indian Railway train where two groups engaged in an argument over the charging unit leading to a point where two men were attacked with a knife by a group before fleeing the spot.

The incident took place at Satna in Madhya Pradesh, in train no 12141 - Patliputra Superfast Express that runs between Mumbai's Lokmanya Tilak Terminus and Patna, Bihar. According to Senior Inspector Mann Singh of Satna RPF, the two passengers travelling in S/4 coach (on seats 35 and 37) on January 16, hailed from Bihar's Arariya district. Mohammad Altaf Alam, 29, and Mohammad Mahtab Abdul, 26, were grievously injured with a knife by some co-passengers and their friends in the incident.

A case has been later registered against the accused under sections 294 (obscene act in public), 323, 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 34 (act by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Indian Penal Code with the Satna Government Railway Police (GRP) and three accused have been arrested while four others are wanted.

The hunt for accused

The PNR (Passenger Name Record) numbers of suspected individuals were obtained from on-duty TTE (Train Ticket Examiner) by the police and the number was shared with the IRCTC (Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation) Delhi from where the details of the accused were secured.

Based on these inputs, a joint team of RPF and GRP conducted a raid at the residences of the offenders but the accused, who had expected such a move, had stayed away from their homes. "The movements of the accused were kept under surveillance by the Cyber Cell of Jabalpur thus revealing their journey from Satna to Nagoud (also in MP). A GRP team was immediately sent to Nagoud and three accused were arrested from here," an RPF officer said.

The arrested accused - Shahnawaz Ahmed, 28, Shoyeb Aalam, 23 and Manish Dadubhai Sahu, 22 - are residents of Nagoud. The police are also looking for three more accused in this case since the investigation has revealed that one person named Riyaz (full name not available) was travelling along with Ahmed on seat numbers 33 and 36.

How it all began?

During Ahmed's interrogation, it was revealed that before the train departed from LTT, Alam was charging his phone when Ahmed asked him to let him use the charging point since his phone was about to switch off due to low battery. Alam, however, refused and that gave rise to a heated argument between the two. The train had departed by then and Ahmed began throwing Alam's luggage on the floor of the compartment. When Alam protested, both Ahmed and Riyaz began hitting him. Throughout the journey, the two abused each other and continued arguing over the charging point. An angry Ahmed later called his relatives and asked them to reach Satna station on the train's route. His elder brother Shoyeb, his friends Bhupendra Singh, Kalam (full name unavailable) and Dadubhai soon entered the compartment and began hitting Alam.

In a few minutes, Singh attacked both the victims on their heads with a knife causing grievous injury and escaped from the spot with others. Both the victims were immediately rushed to the Satna District hospital and were discharged following primary treatment. The police are now looking for Singh, Riyaz, and Kalam.

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