KOLKATA: A mob of Metro passengers allegedly molested and thrashed some young girls on Thursday evening for daring to protest against moral policing, the incident coming barely 72 hours after Monday’s mob attack on a young couple.

The incident occurred almost at the same spot — just outside the Dum Dum Metro station premises — and served to underline the schism between the city’s liberal ethos and its moral police brigade. But Thursday’s incident underscored an important difference as well: it marked a fightback from youngsters seeking their own space against a mob trying to deny them that.

The girls, accompanied by their male friends, went to two police stations — first the Government Railway Police station at Dum Dum (where they were fobbed off over “jurisdiction” issues) and then the Sinthi police station — to register their complaint. “We have had enough of this boorishness and mob violence,” one of the girls told TOI on phone from the Sinthi police station. “We have now decided to fight back,” add-ed one of her friends.

On Monday evening, a mob pushed a young couple out of a Metro rake after it reached Dum Dum station and then thrashed them for “standing too close to each other” while on the train. Wednesday saw the first protests against mobocracy as youngsters converged on Metro stations and then boarded the trains, embracing each other in impromptu “Hok Alingan (Let There Be Hugging)” demonstrations. Thursday’s demonstration by placard-carrying youngsters outside the Dum Dum Metro station building was part of the same protest movement.

“We were protesting peacefully outside the Metro station when one middle-aged person started abusing us and supported the mob that assaulted the couple on Monday. We protested but the man pushed me, touching my breasts, and abused me,” a young woman in her 20s told TOI.

Some of the other girls tried to catch the man but he pushed them away as well. Some other elderly and middle-aged Metro passengers then got into the act, holding back the girls. “The man who molested the protester fled and entered the station premises. We tried to stop him but cops at the gate prevented us from entering and some of them charged at us with batons,” Rabindra Bharati University Human Rights postgraduate student Abhishek Kar said.

“We found support from several people, ranging from the elderly to school students, but there were some who did not like our protest. Some of them said we were jobless and symbols of ‘apasanskriti’. We chose not to get provoked but, then, this man in a yellow shirt came forward from nowhere and started the row,” another Rabindra Bharati University student, Soumi Sen, said.

The girl, along with some of her friends, first went to the Dum Dum GRP, who refused to take their complaint, citing jurisdiction issues, and asked them to go to Sinthi police station. “The incident happened outside the station and the complaint should be lodged with the city police,” a GRP officer told them.

Metro Railway took the same line. “The incident happened outside the station. We don’t know whether there was any molestation. But we heard a group of 20-odd protesters tried to enter the station premises and were stopped by security personnel,” a Metro official said.

The protesters then went to Sinthi police station, where they were asked to give their names and phone numbers before a complaint was lodged. “We have accepted the complaint and are looking into the allegations,” a Sinthi police officer said.

