‘Bharat Borge stood rooted on the tracks’

This paper has managed to track the two crucial eyewitnesses who on Tuesday saw Bharat Borge being knocked down by a speeding local train at Vile Parle. Borge was a prime witness in the Anil Ambani’s helicopter sabotage case.

Fifty-eight-year-old Gopinath Pawar, a lever man with the railways, who saw the incident, said, “I was on duty near the railway crossing when the incident occurred. At around 7.30 am, I saw Borge come to railway track No 4 from the east side. Instead of crossing it, he stayed on the tracks, and by the time I realised what was going on, he was hit by a speeding train going towards Churchgate.”

“So intense was the impact that the man was thrown off nearly 50 metres away from the spot. It was a spine-chilling incident,” he said. “Soon, other railway officials rushed to the spot and took the body for post-mortem. He was wearing a uniform and was carrying a black coloured bag,” added Pawar.

Andheri railway police have also recorded the statement of PKS Pillai, the motorman of the train that knocked Borge down. Pillai, in his statement to the police, said, “I saw a man standing on track No 4, around 100 feet from the train. In a desperate bid to avoid a mishap, I blew the train’s horn, assuming that the man (Borge) would move aside. There was adequate time and distance for him to get out of the away, but he remained stationary.”

Another person who claims to have seen the incident, Raju Soraha, 18, runs an eatery shop near the crossing. Soraha said, “I open the shop at 7 am and the incident occurred a few minutes later. I heard a loud cry near the tracks, and when I rushed to the spot, I saw a man hit by a train. There was blood all over the place.”