Panic gripped Kim railway station in Surat, Gujarat, on Saturday morning after railway authorities found that some vital components had been stolen from the tracks. Mysteriously, the sabotage was found just a few minutes before a train was scheduled to move over the rail lines, sending an instant sigh of relief among the passengers and the staff.
The incident follows recent reports of detonators and gas cylinders on railway tracks in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, for which central agencies like the National Investigation Agency had to intervene. The trackman who first notified the authorities was initially hailed as a local hero for spotting something out of the ordinary.
But in a shocking turn of events, barely three days later, it has come to light that the trackman, Subhash Podar, and two other railway employees were the masterminds behind this sabotage. Their reasons were to achieve social media fame, name and promotion, plus reward, and continue the night duties of trackmen, which were scheduled to be scrapped after the monsoon.
At around 5:25 am, Podar told the police that he found many locks opened and two fishplates—the crucial pieces of metal that hold railway tracks together—removed and kept on adjacent lines between Kim and Kosamba stations. Podar said he saw three men near the tracks who fled upon his approach.
Two trains, including the Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani Express, had crossed the tracks just before the detection. Yet another train was to pass by but was stopped at Kosamba station after receiving the alert from Podar. He, his fellow trackman Manishkumar Surdev Mistry, and Shubham Jaiswal, a contract worker, carried out the repairs on the tracks and enabled the rail movement.
However, detectives soon found discrepancies in Podar’s tale. Loco pilots of previous trains reported nothing amiss, though they crossed minutes before the sabotage was detected. Rajdhani Express ran at 130 km/h between 4:53 and 4:58 AM, while Dadar JU Express crossed between 4:38 and 4:44 AM at 110 km/h speed.
All in all, 71 bolts were found removed—a job that would, under normal circumstances, take upwards of more than two hours to carry out. Moreover, the removal of fishplates is a skilled job, and with proper tools, at least 25 minutes are required. Investigators believed that the fishplates must have been in place when Rajdhani passed, as the loco pilots would notice anything unusual.
Also, though Podar claimed to have seen three men running away, no footprints were found, adding to the suspicions.
The investigators then said that anyone who worked on the tracks for the required two-hour period would have been seen. It now appears that Podar, Mistry, and Jaiswal started their work at around 3 am, removing locks silently along a one-kilometer distance and hiding whenever trains came along.
They used the window between 4:58 and 5:25 AM after the Rajdhani crossed to remove the fishplates and place them across the tracks. Later, Podar informed authorities about the alleged sabotage.
This included even a video of the missing parts, which Podar claimed he had recorded but then deleted. Later on, the investigation found he downloaded a video at 4:57 AM. Photos on Mistry’s phone had a timestamp for 2:57 AM. These proved that the trio was indeed part of this fiasco.
Confronted with overwhelming evidence, all three confessed to their roles in the sabotage. They admitted that they aimed to bring attention to the incident for hoped-for promotions and rewards, social media recognition, and assurance of continuance of night duties.
