4 youngsters from a family mowed down by Mumbai local train while crossing tracks

The incident took place between Borivli and Kandivli railway stations early on Monday.

Four cousins were mowed down by a local train when they were crossing the tracks between the Kandivli and Borivli stations early on Monday — another case highlighting the lack of measures to prevent trespassing along Mumbai’s suburban network.

The incident occurred around 5.30 am when the victims were returning home from their native place in Kankavali, in Maharashtra’s Sindhudurg district. (HT File Photo/Used for representational purpose)

The Government Railway Police (GRP) at Borivli said one of the victims, Sagar Sampat Chavan, 23, was a resident of Jeevan Koya Chawl at Kajupada, in Poisar. The other three, Manoj Chavan, 17, Saiprasad Chavan, 17 and Dattaprasad Chavan, 20, were residents of Kankavli in Sindhudurg. The police said Sagar had visited his village and his cousins came to Mumbai with him for their summer vacation. They were planning to tour the city over the week.

GRP officers said they got a call from the station master at 5.38am about the four cousins lying on the tracks near Poisar. The police said the men may have taken a train from Diva to Dadar on their way back from Sindhudurg and from Dadar, took a fast train to Borivli. “As it does not stop at Kandivli, they must have got off at a signal near Poisar, where the train usually halts for a while. We think Sagar might have jumped off the train to cross the tracks and reach his house and the other three may have followed Sagar,” said Purshottam Karad, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Western Railway GRP). Karad said the cousins may not have noticed the approaching train as it was dark.

Officers are checking CCTV camera recordings to find out where the men boarded the train. Their bodies were handed over to their families.

The railways said it took several initiatives to prevent people from crossing tracks, after hundreds of such deaths were recorded in 2017. “The railways put up fences at many places between the tracks to prevent track-crossing. However, commuters continue to cross the tracks illegally,” said Niket Kaushik, police commissioner (GRP).

“We have lost four boys of a family. we are devastated,” said Deepak Chavan, a relative of the deceased. Deepak added, “If one of the four would have been alive, we would know how did the accident take place but now we can only imagine the sequence of events.”