Mumbai teen narrowly escapes major injury while fighting mobile thief
March 10 will forever remain etched in the memory of this 18-year-old Mumbai youngster. She lost her expensive phone to a thief on a local train that day. But worse, when she resisted, he dragged her till the footboard while hitting her on her hands, leaving her injured. "I didn't want to fall out, so had to let go of my phone," she said.
'There were other passengers too, everything seemed normal'
Fashion designing student Miloni Parekh was returning from Kandivli to her home in Tardeo with her mother after attending a function. "We boarded the ladies' compartment around 10pm. There were 12 other co-passengers, and it seemed normal," says Miloni. But in Santacruz, 'a man, wearing a white shirt, entered the compartment, lunged at me and tried to snatch my phone,' she narrated.
There were no female cops to help Miloni
A shocked Miloni put up a fight with the thief to retrieve her OnePlus phone costing Rs. 38,000. "In the next 30-40 seconds, he dragged me out of my seat and kept hitting me hard on my hand," said Miloni. Her mother screamed for help but other passengers were too scared to react. "There were no female police personnel inside the compartment," she added.
Footage being scanned to ascertain identity
They approached the Government Railway Police (GRP) posted at Bandra and filed an FIR. "We have registered a case of theft and assault used to commit theft under sections 379 and 356 of the Indian Penal Code. We are trying to identify the robber," said Sunil Kumar Jadhav, senior inspector, Bandra GRP. They are also scanning CCTV footage to ascertain the thief's identity.
Snatchings have ended in broken fingers, stitches, even death
Snatchings sometimes result in violent injuries. Last August, a Delhi woman was killed when she fell off a running autorickshaw when thieves pulled at her handbag. Then a DU student needed 38 stitches after thieves attacked her with a sharp object. Last month, a Mumbai woman fell off a moving train, was hit by another and lost some fingers in a robbery bid.
800% rise in suburban train crimes in Mumbai
In the past year, there has been a phenomenal 800% rise in crimes in Mumbai's suburban trains. The most common crime being mobile-snatching, in which passengers often get hurt while fighting to take it back from the thief. In such cases, Section 390 is applied.
