At least 10 aspirants seeking employment with the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) were electrocuted and scores injured while travelling atop the Jammu-Tawi Express on Tuesday.
The incident took place when the victims came into contact with a high-tension wire on the Shahjahenpur-Roza electric line while returning from Bareilly after submitting documents for getting jobs in the police force.
Agitated over the deaths, the ITBP aspirants went on a rampage and torched two coaches of an Express train.
Earlier on Tuesday morning, annoyed over the mismanagement at the ITBP recruitment camp in Bareilly, the aspirants had gone on rampage where they damaged at least 25 vehicles, including a dozen roadways buses.
Confirming the tragic deaths, Special Director General (crime, law & order) Brij Lal said ITBP had already cancelled the recruitment process after the violence in Bareilly and asked the candidates to send their application forms through post within a month.
He said that six companies of the Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) were provided to Bareilly while one company each had been deployed at important railway stations across the State. Brij Lal also claimed that the Bareilly violence took place due to lack of coordination among ITBP authorities, who could not manage such a huge gathering of recruitment aspirants. He also blamed the ITBP officials for their disconnect with the district administration before launching “such a big recruitment drive”.
Reports suggested that the ITBP had called candidates from 11 States to fill 416 posts of tradesman at its Bareilly office on Tuesday. Over 80,000 candidates had reached Bareilly till Monday evening and the figure went up to 1.5 lakh at the recruitment centre even before the process could start on Tuesday morning.
DIG of ITBP (Kumaun Sector) in Bareilly has stated that the force, in a letter dispatched both to the DIG and district magistrate of Bareilly on January 17, had apprised them of the recruitment drive.
The chaos started at the recruitment centre when some youth got agitated and took to the street, pelting stones on vehicles passing by Lal Phatak on the Bareilly-Kasganj highway. The agitated candidates first blocked traffic movement on the highway and then turned violent. They set many roadways buses and private vehicles ablaze. The rampaging youth also tried to torch a petrol pump and looted local traders.
They reportedly damaged the standing cane crop in nearby farms. The agitation was somehow controlled when the ITBP cancelled the recruitment process and asked the candidates to send their application forms via post.