Inaction against hawkers to blame

Commuters travelling on the Western and Central line blamed hawkers for squatting in and around the railway station's premises leading to crowding.

On Friday, despite the tragedy, hawkers had a normal day of business in the ongoing festive season. The Railway Protection Force (RPF) and Government Railway Police (GRP) has drastically failed to take action against the hawkers.

The commuters also blamed the GRP and RPF for not taking adequate measures to control the crowd on the foot-overbridge on Friday.

A senior RPF official said, "We have taken adequate action against the hawkers. When our staff tries to take action against them, they enter into the city police's jurisdiction which makes it impossible to take action against them."

Purshottam Karad, Deputy Commissioner of Police, West Zone, said, "We do take action against the hawkers and more importantly the RPF has the powers to take action against the hawkers."

Commuters claimed that at most of the places there are no guards and the guards deployed at the bridge are not well trained to manage the crowd. "We face issues in climbing up and down the staircases daily. Most of the times commuters voluntarily come forward to work like GRP and RPF. Friday's incident is the result of the authorities' negligence and lack of infrastructure at the FOB," said Rahul Madane, a daily commuter.

HAWKER MENACE

• Commuters blamed the hawkers encroaching the station’s premises for the crowding.
   
• Railway and city police passed the buck for taking action against the hawkers.