Five youths were thrown out of a running train by unidentified passengers in the early hours of Thursday near Nandgaon in Bhusawal section of Central Railway. Four of them died.According to Devendra Ashok Satvarkar, a resident of Bhusawal, who survived the attack and has been admitted to a hospital at Manmad, he and four other Maharashtrian youths from Bhusawal were travelling on the Mumbai-bound Muzaffarpur-Lokmanya Tilak Terminus (Kurla) Pavan Express on Wednesday night. They were coming to Mumbai in search of jobs.Around 1 am on Thursday, they got into a brawl with some other long-distance passengers over sharing of seats. Devendra told the railway police that the passengers who were already occupying the seats assaulted the group. As the local youths fought back, the passengers in the train united against them and in a fit of rage, allegedly threw the youths out of the train.Devendra said the other four, who were thrown out along with him, died on the spot. Their bodies were picked up between Chalisgaon and Nandgaon.Devendra was found lying near the tracks by the driver of the Vidarbha Express and was brought to Manmad, where he was admitted to a local hospital.The Additional Divisional Railway Manager of Bhusawal section, Suresh Chandra, when contacted, said he was not certain about the cause of the deaths. ‘‘I can’t say whether it was a riot over sharing of seats or something else. But our information is that the youths were frustrated and wanted to end their lives,’’ he said. The manager clarified that the deaths had nothing to do with the issue of migrants versus locals.
