Mumbai: Mumbai police has issued a warning for women travelling in ladies compartment of suburban local trains: If a friendly fellow commuter offers anyone a soft drink, this would be best refused. Mumbai police is currently investigating a case where a girl in her twenties has been targeting women in ladies compartments by getting them chatting, then offering them a spiked cold drink. According to police, the young woman gets down from the train along with her target and then flees with the valuables the victim is carrying.
The case came to light after a 40-year old woman working in a hospital in Girgaum was dumped by the woman. As per the complainant Gauri Sankpal, on Tuesday morning around 11 am she took a Panvel train from Sandhurst Road to return home. “I was extremely tired since I was working at the hospital for two days on the go. I got in the train and dozed off. The train was relatively empty. At Wadala station, a well-dressed girl in her early twenties, came and sat next to me in spite of there being several empty seats,” Sankpal said to Indian Express. Gauri Sankpal resides in Mankhurd.
The girl then got talking to Sankpal and asked her questions about her home and workplace. “Although I wanted to sleep, it would have been rude to not reply to her. I told her I work at a hospital and stay at Mankhurd. During the course of the conversation, she pulled out a cold drink bottle from the bag and had a sip. She then told me to take a sip as well. Not suspecting anything amiss, I too had a sip.”
The girl then told Sankpal that she too was visiting a friend in Mankhurd and would get off with her. “We got off at Mankhurd and started walking towards the main road. At that point, she suddenly pointed towards my gold chain and started praising it. She then asked me to show it to her. I gave her the gold chain,” Sankpal said. The girl then told her that her friend was not at home and she would have to return to the railway station, and left.
Sankpal, now dizzy, sat down for a bit. “Nearly 15 minutes later I felt all right. The girl had gone missing and she had not returned my chain. I had no recollection of what we were talking about. Either there was something in the drink she had given me or she hypnotised me. I had given away my chain and did not even ask her to return it,” she said. Sankpal, resides in Mankhurd along with her two sons, approached the Mankhurd Police station where an FIR was registered. However, the Mankhurd police have transferred the case to the Wadala Government Railway Police (GRP) since the girl entered the train at Wadala.
