Another woman TTE assaulted in MMTS train

• This is the second such incident in the capital within a week

Hyderabad: A woman Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE) was assaulted on a board a local train on Wednesday by an eight-member gang women passengers allegedly travelling without tickets. This is the second similar incident in the city within a week.

According to police, TTE Kaushalya was attacked by the gang near Begumpet railway station when she demanded the women passengers for their tickets. When one of the passengers refused to show her ticket, Kaushalya snatched her cell phone. Objecting to it, the woman got furious and a verbal duel ensued between them. In the scuffle, the railway official was beaten up by the gang.

According to another version, heated argument between the TTE and the gang took a nasty turn when Kaushalya slapped the woman passenger and the gang members retaliated by attacking her with blows.

She was rushed to South Central Railway Hospital in Lalaguda for treatment. According to Nampally Railway police, a case has been registered against the suspects. “We took four of the gang members into custody and efforts are being made to nab the others. We stepped up patrols in MMTS stations after the last incident at Hafeezpet,” police said.

When contacted Begumpet police station, sub- inspector V Ramchander said that the victim did not lodge any complaint with the police and the case was being investigated by the Railway police.

Meanwhile, the Train Ticket Collectors’ Association and Railway Workers’ Union strongly condemned the inhuman incident. They demanded that the Railway Board act upon such incidents and said security of ticket collectors could not be left to chance.

In the past, three similar incidents happened; one in Anantapur where the ticket collector Sanjeevaiah died of heart attack due to severe injuries when he was attacked by ticketless travellers and the second one in Kazipet where Vijay Kumar was pushed off the train by unidentified persons for asking a ticket. He is still undergoing treatment and the recent one Geetha who is also undergoing treatment at Yashoda Hospital. The Railway Board remained silent spectator in all the cases. Security personnel are deployed only in first class compartment and not in general ones, which makes the task of miscreants’ easier, rued the Association members.