Mumbai A 20-year-old woman fought off her molester and got him arrested after he tried to rob her inside a local train in Mumbai on Monday evening.
The incident occurred between Marine Lines and Churchgate railway stations at about 6 pm, when the college student was on her way to attend classes. According to the Churchgate Government Railway Police (GRP) officers, the woman, a resident of Worli, had boarded a ladies compartment of a Churchgate local from Prabhadevi station.
In her statement to the police, she said that she boarded that compartment because there was a woman with two children there. As the train crossed Charni Road station, a man climbed the running train and got inside the ladies compartment. He sat near the other woman in the coach, making her and her children uncomfortable. The woman got down at Marine Lines station.
As the train was approaching Churchgate, the 20-year-old came near a door, preparing to alight at the station. Seeing her near the door, the accused came close to her and when the train stopped at a signal between Marine Lines and Churchgate stations, the accused tried to snatch her bag. When she resisted, the accused grabbed her hair and kissed her on the lips.
Though he snatched her bag, in the scuffle both, the woman and the accused fell off the train on the side of the tracks. “When the accused tried to flee with her bag and mobile handset, the woman stood up and started raising an alarm. Within seconds, three men from the adjacent compartment of the same train jumped in the tracks and intercepted the robber,” said a police officer from the Churchgate GRP.
The men helped the woman and alerted the police. The GRP officers escorted the woman to JJ Hospital for treatment as she had sustained minor injuries on her hands and legs in the scuffle, the officer added.
The accused has been identified as Pappu Gupta, a Goregaon resident, and booked under sections 393 and 394 (causing injury while committing robbery) and section 354 (outraging modesty of a woman) of the India Penal Code.