After an activist was arrested for allegedly inciting migrant labourers to gather at Mumbai’s Bandra station to protest, an FIR has been registered against a television journalist over his report that trains would restart, which is likely to have prompted the workers further.

The accused, Rahul Kulkarni, based in Osmanabad district of Maharashtra, has been detained and police are in the process of bringing him to Mumbai, an official told PTI.

Advertisement

In a recent news report over a railway ministry note, Kulkarni had allegedly said Jansadharan special trains would resume for people stranded due to the lockdown.

He has been booked under IPC Sections 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant and 269, 270 (negligent, malignant act likely to spread infection of disease dangerous to life), 117 (abetting commission of offence by public), the official said.

Meanwhile, according to a press release by the South Central Railways dated April 13, it is stated that it has been decided to run Jansadharan specials for clearing stranded passengers and migrant labourers.

The same was shared by AAP leader Sanjay Singh questioning how the ministry could take such a decision when it was widely expected that the lockdown would be extended.

“If it was more or less decided at a meeting of the PM and Chief Ministers on April 12 that the lockdown would be extended, how come railways officials were preparing a plan to run a special train? Who spread the rumour,” questioned Sanjay Singh.

However, the South Central Railways today put out a clarification stating that there is “no such proposal to run special trains for migrants and that all passenger trains stand cancelled till 3 May.”

Earlier, an activist, Vinay Dubey, was arrested on Wednesday for inciting migrants through his social media posts calling for action. He had put out several social media posts around a campaign “Chalo Ghar Ki Ore (let’s go home)” instigating migrants stranded by the Coronavirus lockdown, desperate to return to their native villages.

In a video that has been circulated since yesterday, Dubey is heard asking the government to organise a journey home for the migrants, since the lockdown “will be over on April 14”.

He was booked under Sections 117, 153 A, 188, 269, 270 and 505 (2) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Section 3 of the Epidemic Diseases Act. He has been sent to police custody till April 21.

Meanwhile, the Maharashtra government is probing whether the posts of Vinay Dubey on Twitter and Facebook were potentially responsible for the rumors that drove hundreds to Bandra.

Defying lockdown orders, nearly 3,000 stranded, hungry and angry migrant labourers from different parts of India thronged near the Bandra railway station on Tuesday demanding that they should be given transportation to return to their native places immediately.

The Mumbai Police, which attempted to cajole them from jamming there in such large numbers, resorted to a mild lathi charge when sections of the restive hordes threatened to go out of control.